Sinema Is Making Some Dumb Choices

 

by Pa Rock

Citizen Journalist

Chuck Schumer would like to have the iron-fisted control over Democratic senators that Moscow Mitch has over Republican members of the Senate, but as long as West Virginia's Joe Manchin claims to play for Democratic team, that is unlikely to happen.  Manchin has a long history of placing his own interests above those of party or country.  And now, by being the maverick Democrat in an evenly divided Senate, Manchin sits in the sweet spot of being the key vote on many important issues - and key votes attract a lot of attention - and cash.

In an evenly split Senate, one rebellious senator can be a major pain in the ass - and one is plenty of bad news for the affable Majority Leader, Chuck Schumer, but Democrats, being Democrats, have a long history of not being the best team players.  Earlier this month after the Senate parliamentarian had ruled that a proposal to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour could not be considered in the COVID relief package as a part of the budget reconciliation process, Bernie Sanders tried to push it into the package anyway through a legislative maneuver, but eight Democratic senators voted against the Sanders move and the effort died.

One of those eight Democrats was Senator Krysten Sinema of Arizona.   Sinema had no doubt caught Schumer's attention a bit earlier when she announced that she opposed doing away with the filibuster, a legislative ploy in the Senate that requires a super-majority of 60 votes in order to pass many pieces of legislation.  Sinema and Manchin were both opposed to removing the filibuster from the Senate voting process.

And now she was voting against a measure that would open the door to substantially increasing the minimum wage for many Americans.  But Senator Sinema didn't just vote to block a pay raise for impoverished Americans - she did it with dramatic flair.  When it came time for the senator to cast her vote, she marched down to the front of the chamber, announced her vote, and gave the motion, quite literally, two thumbs-down!

While the senator's motivations for casting her vote in such a flamboyant manner remain unclear, what is becoming obvious is that her adolescent theatrics are not playing well back home in Arizona.  This morning Daily Kos published results from recent Civiqs Polling that suggests Sinema's constituents are not amused.  That polling, which compares her popularity to Arizona's other Democratic senator, Mark Kelly,  has her overall rating at 29% favorable and 40% unfavorable compared to Kelly's 48% favorable and 41% unfavorable.  It also shows her being seriously behind Kelly among both Democrats and Independents.

Senator Sinema may feel that nudging a few more Republicans into her column will help her win future elections, but those votes will be useless if she loses support among her Democratic base and independents.

Arizona is turning blue, Senator Sinema.  You can either ride that tide to a long career in public service -  or you can be washed away by it.   This would be a great time to smarten up!