Changes

 A group of friends and constant readers took to a text thread early Friday morning, responding to the news that first term senator Krysten Sinema was changing her party affiliation from Democrat to Independent. We were in a bit of a flurried haze, having just relaxed to the notion of having a fifty-one to forty-nine seat Democratic majority. Senator Sinema chose, more than a month after the mid-term election to announce her true colors. 

Opinions varied, but there was some agreement that at least she didn't wait until the first major test of the now much more narrow majority in the Senate to announce, "You know what? I've been thinking..." To her credit, she gave an interview in which he let us know, “Nothing will change about my values or my behavior." Comforting only up to the point when one considers her values and behavior. Mitch McConnell said of Senator Krysten, “She is, today, what we have too few of in the Democratic Party: a genuine moderate and a dealmaker.” To that end, she is also a deal-breaker. Her vote helped sink a change to Senate rules that would have allowed for a simple-majority to advance certain measures that her now former party considered priorities. She also wasn’t on board for President Joe Biden’s infrastructure packages or an effort by the progressive wing of her party to boost the minimum wage to fifteen dollars an hour. And there was that little matter of a Supreme Court. Had she acted with her party on the filibuster, it is possible that Roe v. Wade wouldn't have been overturned. 

Ultimately, it's a game. It's a numbers game. Knowing the players is easy if you have a program, or it should be if the players aren't prone to switching uniforms in the middle of the game. The other hanging chad, if you'll excuse the nostalgic allusion, is Joe Manchin. The senator from West Virginia is another speed bump in the expressway of Democratic Majority. While he continues to bear the standard of his blue brothers and sisters, Senator Joe can also be found on the other side of the aisle, arms crossed, refusing to take a stand with his party on things like climate change and, well mostly climate change. Joe's a coal guy, and to that end, a friend inserted into our thread that he was the lump in our Christmas stocking. 

Which is what spurred me on to thinking of Krysten Sinema as a flat tire. If you're aware that you're riding on a wheel that's a little low before you start a trip, you can anticipate the trouble and add some air to get to the next stop. A lot better than hitting the highway and suddenly finding that you've got a blowout at sixty miles an hour. 

It's probably also time to change that tire, if you catch my meaning.