Welcome to the Commentary Magazine Daily podcast today is Monday, February 1, 2021.

I'm John Pudhord's the editor of Commentary Magazine. Please remember to go to iTunes and leave us a five star review if you've not done so already. We've had a wonderful experience over the last week after I've been asking you to do this reading some of the very nice comments that I have accepted by asking you to go leave them. So I thank you for making us, you know, it's like throwing yourself a surprise party and going, oh my god, this is such a wonderful surprise. But anyway, it is

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But and I thank you in advance and I thank everybody who's done it so far. Thanks so much and also here to thank you are executive editor Abe Greenwald. Hi Abe.

John and thank you.

Senior writer Christine Rosen. Hi Christine.

Hi John and thank you even though we're aggressively quartering, courting the algorithm rather than our human contact, but okay.

I'll take our our favorite blood. I was so on brand and so I know. Hi John. Okay so so much to talk about.

Apparently today if the snow doesn't to prevent it, Joe Biden is going to meet with 10 this sort of gang of 10 Republicans

who are proposing a skinny version, I guess you would call it of the coronavirus relief package that I have to say reading it is so sensible in its parameters.

That it's it's kind of astonishing and and in some ways moves them to the left of Biden on economic terms because they're saying why on earth would you want to give, you know, $1,400 of stimulus to people who are making a couple hundred thousand dollars a year that doesn't make any sense.

And we can limit the cost of this incredibly expensive bill simply by putting a ceiling on the income levels of the people who received the check.

Which not only seems evidently sensible, but as I say is sort of like why are we why are we subsidizing the rich, you know, that doesn't that doesn't follow.

There are a couple of other things including this extension of unemployment benefits to September which they are proposing to extend through May the $600 or $300 federal extra subvention in terms of unemployment.

Stuff that was sort of cobbled together to produce a kind of like eye poppantly large bill which was intended in part I think to calm the markets or give people the sense that you know the cavalry was on its way to rescue them.

Anyway, Biden is now under pressure from Bernie Sanders and others to take this moment to use the complicated process known as reconciliation to get this democratic wish list that has been stuffed into the COVID reconciliation bill including a federal minimum wage at $15 which

aside from the fact that that would be really bad policy forget that it's really bad policy why on earth you would you would do that now or not if it's such a great thing and everybody wants it so much so fine so do it in its own standalone bill and force people to go up or down on it like you know it doesn't have to be stuffed into this bill anyway.

So those are the politics of the present moment and it is I guess a real this is the first moment at which we see a kind of normal politics being practiced here which is Biden says he wants unity he says he wants he says he can work with the publicans he said that for a year they're giving him a chance to work with them and now the question is will Democrats in Biden's own coalition go along with a compromise path.

I suppose we need to identify you know the the more the governing wing of the democratic party which regards Republican recalcitrant says is hostile and really kind of wants to leverage the reconciliation process to force some of this stuff through which seems kind of dubious to me but that's nevertheless it's parliamentary so you can still be a governing party that way and the other side of the equation the real progressive left which wants to destroy the party.

You know you know you use it as a bloody tunic to whip up sentiment in the streets against Republicans and is turning on Joe Biden for for daring to talk to Republicans at all in this moment you know not understanding the fact that they you know Republicans through that thrown out on their ears you don't have to talk to them anymore.

party is at this point between, you know, to say, who's got the upper hand here?

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