 Well, in the least surprising news ever, Joe Manchin is already signaling that he will not support the Build Back Better Act less than a week after the Progressive Caucus caved and decided to vote for the so-called bipartisan infrastructure proposal. So in an article for Newsweek, John Jackson writes, Manchin signals hesitation to passing Biden's social agenda with inflation getting worse. Now he doesn't explicitly say that he's not gonna vote for this because of inflation, but really what he's doing is laying the groundwork for his inevitable no-vote on Build Back Better. He tweeted out, By all accounts, the threat posed by record inflation to the American people is not transitory and is instead getting worse from the grocery store to the gas pump. Americans know the inflation tax is real and DC can no longer ignore the economic pain Americans feel every day. So he doesn't cite Build Back Better, but of course his excuse when he votes no will be, I couldn't support any new spending during this time when we see inflation like this. Now, John Jackson kind of reads between the lines to deduce what I think is pretty logical that this is him kind of telling everyone I'm a no-vote. Shocker. Manchin doesn't specifically cite Biden's plan in his brief Twitter post, but earlier this month he spoke about his hesitation regarding the potential impact the spending package could have on the economy. Throughout the last three months, I have been straightforward about my concerns that I will not support a reconciliation package that expands social programs and irresponsibly adds to our nearly $29 trillion in national debt that no one else seems to care about, nor will I support a package that risks hurting American families suffering from historic inflation, mentioned said during a November 1st press conference. Simply put, I will not support a bill that is this consequential without thoroughly understanding the impact it will have on our national debt, our economy, and the American people, Manchin added. Let's get one thing straight. He doesn't actually care about inflation. He doesn't actually care about whether or not the American people are suffering. If he did, he would support policies to improve their lives, such as build back better. But this is about him appeasing his corporate donors, and one Republican billionaire donor is actually holding a fundraiser for him very soon, perhaps to thank him for tanking his own party's agenda. So this is not shocking to me, but knowing the way that Joe Manchin is knowing how dishonest he is and that he would pull out whatever excuse to vote against this. Now I have to ask myself, do progressives in the House regret voting for the so-called bipartisan infrastructure bill before the Senate voted on build back better, knowing that this was not just a possibility, but a likelihood? Remember, the reason why Ro Khanna decided to support this in an interview with Jack Uger, he explained that he believed that there was a simplistic agreement between him and the president, and that Manchin ultimately would be a yes vote on build back better. I think publicly, Manchin doesn't want to make those commitments. But our belief is that the president has a private commitment from 50 senators that he could pass this and that he didn't come to us for many, many months, and he only came to the progressives once he had that commitment. I personally believe that he will pass the build back better agenda than Manchin ultimately will be a yes vote. Turns out that might not be the case. And again, less than a week after they passed the so-called bipartisan infrastructure deal, he's already signaling that he's not going to support what you wanted him to vote for. Because why would he? He got his corporate handout in the form of the bipartisan infrastructure, aka toll road bill. So he has zero incentive to support this, especially when his corporate donors are in his ear, saying, don't support this. Now, Pramila Jayapal, she got assurances from people in the House who are conservative as well, right wing Democrats, allied with the Manchins and the cinemas of the world. And she thought it was necessary to vote for the infrastructure bill because they looked her in the eye. I wish I were kidding about this, but this is actually something that she said. And every single one of those individuals looked us in the eyes and said they are voting for it. Yeah, so what's to stop them from also suddenly having a change of heart because of inflation concerns? I mean, this is why they should have never caved. Now, in an interview with Rachel Maddow, Pramila Jayapal still is indicating that she believes that progressives won somehow. And she is very, very adamant that there's going to be a vote on billback better next week. We'll see about that because they're waiting on an economic impact analysis to be conducted. And it doesn't seem as if it's going to be finished by then and even if it is finished by then. I mean, even Rachel Maddow kind of seemed as if she was skeptical that they wouldn't just come up with an excuse as to why they wouldn't support it. It's really sad to see things play out the way that I expected it to play out. But again, if you are even somewhat savvy, you know that this is what Joe Manchin was going to do and Progressives got rolled. The bad thing, however, is that Joe Biden is probably going to sign the so-called bipartisan infrastructure bill into law on Monday. And if that happens, then that's it. Joe Manchin is probably not going to be a yes vote on billback better, which means that we're net worse off because of that bipartisan infrastructure bill when it comes to climate change. See, if you don't pass both of them simultaneously, then overall we're doing more harm than good. And that's really sad. And I would like to think that maybe this is going to be some sort of a learning experience for progressives. But odds are they're still going to be weak. Odds are they're still going to cave in future negotiations, hence why Democratic Party leadership is never going to take any of their threats seriously because they're not serious and they will cave.