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On Wednesday, Sen. Joe Manchin appeared on MSNBCs Morning Joeto talk about the state of negotiations over President Joe Bidens Covid-19 relief package. The network posted the video with a misleading headline: Sen. Manchin calls for bipartisanship on Covid relief plan.

The headline isnt technically inaccurate. Manchin did profess a desire for Republicans to have an opportunity to shape the coming legislation, saying that he would oppose efforts to abolish the filibuster. Ive been in the minority when theyre jammed. Its not the way this place is supposed to work, he said.

But the real messageManchin delivered was a different one. He had recently spoken to Biden about the path forward, he said, and Biden was quite clear. He basically said, I dont want to go down the path we went down in two-oh-nine when we negotiated for eight months and still didnt have a product and had to do what were doing now. I said, Fine, Mr. President, Im happy to start this process.

The process he was referring to is budget reconciliation, the parliamentary avenue through which specific kinds of legislation can travel with a simple majority vote, avoiding the filibuster. And the reasoning behind it that we cant make the same mistakeas in 2009 marks a startling departure from the Democratic Partys long-running inability to learn from failure. Such a take on that years Democratic legislative strategy would have found broad support among the most progressive elements of the party in years past, but to see it endorsed by Manchin and Biden effectively makes the assessment unanimous from left to right arguably the most united the party has been since it was founded.

The 2009-10 term was so traumatizing to Democrats who lived through it that many, including Biden in his conversation with Manchin, have collapsed the staggering varieties of Republican obstruction of a broad range Democratic priorities from the stimulus to Obamacare to judicial nominations to Wall Street reform into one dark memory of an experience never to be repeated.

The 2016 presidential campaign of Sen. Bernie Sanders ushered in a new generation to Democratic politics, many of whom experienced the consequences of the 2008 financial crisis and the failure to respond to it adequately but werent following the day-to-day congressional drama that produced it.

Those new to politics may be lucky enough to not even know the name Max Baucus. For those who lived through that year(-plus) on Capitol Hill, his apparition is enough to spike blood pressure to dangerous levels.

Democrats entered the 2009 congressional term with 58 members of their Senate caucus, tantalizingly and, it would turn out, debilitatingly close to the 60 needed to end a GOP filibuster. On April 28, 2009, Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter switched to the Democratic Party. That meant 59.

Al Franken had defeated incumbent Republican Norm Coleman in Minnesota but was not sworn in right away; Republicans cleverly litigated the election, dragging the recount out for months, knowing that each day Franken was kept from the upper chamber was worth the price of the legal costs. On July 7, 2009, Franken finally became a senator, giving the party 60.

But Sen. Ted Kennedy died six weeks later. On Feb. 4, 2010, Scott Brown was sworn in as a Republican from Massachusetts, ending the partys super majority.

To seebudget reconciliationendorsed by Manchin and Biden effectively makes the assessment unanimous from left to right.

The first order of business in 2009, as it is in 2021, was a stimulus package to get the economy, losing jobs by the millions, back on its feet. Obama, in his new memoir, A Promised Land, describes the pivotal meeting during the transition in which the wings were clipped off of it. Incoming White House economic adviser Christina Romer suggested a stimulus in the trillion-dollar range.

Theres no fucking way, Obama recalls his chief of staff Rahm Emanuel saying, suggesting something in the $700 billion range instead.

From then on, insider politics drove the number that Democrats would push for. In early February, Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Neb., said that he expected the final package to be below $800 billion, claiming that as an economic matter it ought not to be too robust. For me its not symbolism, its an economic matter. At some point its just too big, he said. I asked him if he felt that $800 billion was the point at which economists believed it was too large. Its whatever gets 60 votes, 61 votes, he said, smiling, acknowledging that economics had nothing to do with it.

Emanuels prognostication had become self-fulfilling and Nelson, along with the few Republicans willing to negotiate, knew they held the cards. Budget reconciliation was available to Democrats, but they had chosen not to use it.

In talks with Sens. Specter, Olympia Snowe, and Susan Collins, the proposal was whittled down, with Collins arbitrarily insisting no funds for school construction or upgrades be included. So that was cut. The resulting $787 billion package was woefully small, leaving unemployment hovering at 10 percent by November 2010.

Obama had known two years earlier that if the economy was still struggling, his party would pay the price yet his team had come up short. Leaving that transition meeting, David Axelrod, a close adviser, told him, Its going to be one hell of a midterm, shaking his head.

Obama writes in his memoir: This time I said nothing, admiring his occasional, almost endearing ability to state the obvious.

In the end, Specter, still a Republican, joined Snowe and Collins in voting for the rescue package on the Senate floor in February.It came at the cost of paring it down severely and extending the pain of the recession.Though the economy eventually began growing slowly, millions were left out of work, and voters threw Democrats out of the House in 2010 and the Senate in 2014. The recovery plodded along. Ten years it took, because it wasnt deep enough and strong enough, Majority Leader Chuck Schumertold Rachel Maddowin a recent interview. Ten years. Were not going to make that mistake with Covid.

In the same interview, Schumer blasted his partys approach to the Affordable Care Act. Look at 200[9], where we spent a year and a half trying to get something good done, ACA, Obamacare, and we didnt do all the other things that had to be done. We will not repeat that mistake, he said. We will not repeat that mistake.

Republicans in the Senate have countered by suggesting Democrats lop off more than two-thirds of their proposal, bringing it down to $600 billion. Thats an offer the 2009 Democratic Party would have taken seriously. This time around, Montana Sen. Jon Tester, one of the handful of red-state Democrats remaining, told CNN he was fine with the price tag.I dont think $1.9 trillion, even though it is a boatload of money, is too much money. I think now is not the time to starve the economy, he said.

If its $1.9 trillion, so be it, Manchin told a nonplussedMika Brzezinski.

Max Baucus, a Democrat from Montana, was chair of the Senate Finance Committee in 2009, which, given its role in revenue policy, took the lead in drafting the Affordable Care Act. Baucuss longtime lieutenant, Jim Messina, meanwhile, had gone to the White House as Emanuels deputy chief of staff. As Messina sat down to cut deals with the major stakeholders in the health care industry Big Pharma, hospitals, medical device makers, and insurance companiesBaucus zeroed in on what he considered to be the three most likely Republicans to back what would eventually be known as Obamacare: Sens. Chuck Grassley of Iowa, Mike Enzi of Wyoming, and Olympia Snowe of Maine. In the spring, together with Democrats Jeff Bingaman of New Mexico and Kent Conrad of North Dakota, they formed the so-called Gang of Six a half-dozen finance committee members who met regularly to negotiate the bill, collectively representing a population of less than 10 million. Along with much of the rest of the congressional press corps, I spent countless hours standing outside the meeting room they commandeered in the Hart Senate Office Building, collecting tidbits on their crawling backroom talks.

Lets pause to consider whats become of these lead Obamacare architects since. Messina became a political and corporate consultant, working for the Tories in theU.K. as part of the team that advised former Prime Minister David Cameron to put Brexit up for a vote, because it would surely lose (what could go wrong?). From there, he helped run the Yes campaign for the Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi on a referendum on a major parliamentary reorganization. Renzi lost in a landslide and, like Cameron, he resigned. Messina was then hired by new U.K. Prime Minister Theresa Mays reelection campaign, another disaster. Jim Messina is perhaps the worlds most successful political and corporate advisor, reads Messinas bioat The Messina Group, declining to mention his role in blowing up the United Kingdom.

Baucus, meanwhile, did not run for reelection in 2014 and was named ambassador to China by Obama. In one of the most startling jaunts through the revolving door in world history, he followed that by joining the board of the Chinese behemoth Alibaba.

But back to the Hart hallway. With each passing day, Baucus, Snowe, and others would emerge to talk about the genuine progress they were making and their hope for a light at the end of the tunnel. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada and White House advisers had warned Obama they werent serious and were just stalling for time. But we decided it was best to let Baucuss process play itself out, Obama writes in his memoir. During an Oval Office meeting, though, I made a point of warning him not to let Grassley string him along.

Trust me, Mr. President, Obama recalls Baucus saying. Chuck [Grassley] and I have already discussed it. Were going to have this thing done by July.

By July, the House had indeed passed health care reform through each of its relevant committees. But the Hart meetings dragged on. Now matter how hard we pressed, though, we couldnt get Baucus to complete his work, Obama writes.

So what was the holdup? Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell had been instructing his soldiers to drag out the talks as long as possible in hopes of killing the whole thing and bringing Obama down with it. If were able to stop Obama on this, it will be his Waterloo. It will break him, said South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint in July, who went on to lead the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank.

Obama called Baucus to the White House in late July. Times up, Max, Obama says he told him. Youve given it your best shot. Grassleys gone. He just hasnt broken the news to you yet.

I respectfully disagree, Mr. President, Baucus said. I know Chuck. I think were this close to getting him, he added, holding his finger and thumb an inch apart, asking to give him through the summer recess to keep working.

Mitch McConnell had been instructing his soldiers to drag outObamacare talks as long as possible in hopes of killing the whole thing.

A part of me wanted to get up, grab Baucus by the shoulders, and shake him till he came to his senses, Obama writes. I decided that this wouldnt work. Obama gave him until mid-September.

So lawmakers went home. At an Iowa town hall, Grassley, still an active member of the Gang of Six, trashed it, giving credence to the burgeoning conspiracy theory that government-run death panels were part of the bill. You have every right to fear, he said at the town hall, adding that we should not have a government run plan to decide when to pull the plug on grandma.

Obama called both Baucus and Grassley into the Oval Office. Grassley, Obama recalled, listed five objections to the bill. Let me ask you a question, Chuck, Obama said. If Max took every one of your latest suggestions, could you support the bill?

Well, said Grassley.

Are there any changes any at all that would get us your vote?

Obama describes an awkward silence before Grassley looked up and met my gaze.

I guess not, Mr. President, Grassley said.

In September, now several weeks past Obamas deadline, Enzi, another charter member of the Gang, told an angry Wyoming town hall he was only in the talks in order to stall it. If I hadnt been involved in this process as long as I have and to the depth as I have, you would already have national health care, he said.

Finally, in mid-October, after three weeks of public hearings and amendments, the whittled-down bill came up for a vote in the Senate Finance Committee. Snowe voted for it, giving Obama and Baucus the bipartisan victory they had been searching for. When it finally came to the floor, on December 24, she voted no, along with every other Senate Republican. McConnell had gotten her back in line.

Then came Scott Browns win on January 19, 2010, and Democrats ended up finishing the legislation using the reconciliation process. Obama signed it into law on March 23, 2010. So that the bill would appear to cost less federal money in its 10-year Congressional Budget Office analysis, however, most of the benefits were delayed. So, on the one hand, voters were warned the bill would kill grandma and that it would mean long wait times and rationed care, and they were frustrated by more than a year of dysfunction. And on the other hand, they had nothing to balance the ledger, feeling none of the upside for several years. Republicans immediately went to the Supreme Court in an effort to have it declared unconstitutional.

For some reason, Democrats would rather try a different route this time around. OnMorning Joe, Manchin suggested a lawmaking process so reasonable that, for Senate Democrats, its downright radical. If they wanna be reasonable and they wanna participate, then we work with them, said Manchin of his GOP colleagues. Lets see if they have an amendment, a reasonable amendment. If they have something zeroed fully stripped from the package it gets no votes. Then the Democrats vote, and we move on.

A legislative body debating an issue, voting, and allowing that vote to determine the outcome: Its so crazy, it just might work.

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Democrats Actually Learned From the Failures of 2009 Ryan Grim - The Intercept

Nearly 18 years ago, California's only gubernatorial recall drew 135 candidates, including several B-list celebrities and one A-lister: Arnold Schwarzenegger, who swept into office on a Republican promise to clean up state government. With just two statewide elections in the U.S. this year governors races in Virginia and New Jersey another California recall would likely become the biggest political event of 2021.

Getting the recall onto the ballot is the first lift; voters would then have to decide in a special election whether to recall Newsom and simultaneously which candidate they would prefer instead.

The recall could still fail to qualify. The deadline to certify is March 17, and the campaign is still operating on a shoestring budget by statewide campaign standards, relying on volunteers and some paid mail to collect the 1.5 million valid signatures they need. Proponents claim they have 1.3 million total signatures, still a ways off the nearly 2 million they will likely need to compensate for invalid signatories.

Still, the campaign had a surprisingly high rate of valid signatures in the last statewide report through early January, hovering around 85 percent. California county registrars have verified about 600,000 signatures so far.

This public report does show a very high validity rate but their ultimate success relies on a few things: what happens to their response rate and what happens to their validity rates as they need to broaden their audiences out past just the hardest-core anti-Newsom audiences? said Ned Wigglesworth, a consultant who is not affiliated with the campaign. This huge flag is, as they work their way through the voter file, have they gotten this low-hanging fruit?

Some supporters are not waiting around to see. The National Union of Healthcare Workers has launched an effort to dissuade people from signing onto the recall, including testimonials from hospital workers about how a Newsom recall would undercut them, after it became clear it might qualify and people wanted to do something about it, union president Sal Rosselli said.

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His polls are sinking. Democrats are mobilizing. The Newsom recall just got real. - POLITICO

PIERRE, S.D. (KELO) South Dakotas state legislature only has 11 Democrats while the other 94 legislators are Republicans. Democratic Sen. Red Dawn Foster of Pine Ridge says being among such a minority isnt easy.

Theres a couple committees that we do not have representation on, so there are interns just as note keepers in there, so that they keep abreast of whats going on in those committees, and so it definitely has been a challenge, Foster said.

Shes one of only three Democrats in the Senate where there are 32 Republicans. Over in the House, there are 62 Republicans and just eight Democrats.

Its always an uphill battle, theres nothing we can do without bipartisan support and making a friend, so in that way it makes us make sure that anything that we bring is vetted that we want to get passed, Democratic Rep. Jamie Smith of Sioux Falls said.

Its two-fold, Democratic Rep. Oren Lesmeister of Parade said. One, it gets frustrating sometimes. We try to pass some legislation, and theres times that its dead on arrival as they would say.

But there can be camaraderie in any small group.

The other side of the coin is, though, being such a small caucus as we call it, with eight in the House and three in the Senate, 11 total, were like family, Lesmeister said. So we know everybodys bills, we know whats going on, we understand issues that are coming up, whether its in the Senate or House.

You automatically get drawn in to one anothers lives, and we do. Theres a great amount of care between all of us, and you got to have somebody that has your back in Pierre, and we know we have each others backs, Smith said.

I know everyone in our caucus, and Ive gotten a lot of support as a new legislator because I am the only new Democrat as well, so Ive seen some advantages there to having a small group that maybe I could get lost in the shuffle in a bigger group, Democratic Rep. Jennifer Keintz of Eden said.

Foster says there is more than one issue with having that 94 to 11 split.

I think that its not only difficult to accomplish the legislative goals, but it doesnt make for good dialogue, because diversity of thought, diversity, inclusion and being able to really flesh out legislation and ideas, especially the communities that we represent are underrepresented in the legislation, Foster said.

While the legislature is about 90% Republican, as of February 1, only about 48% of active registered voters in the state were Republican.

I still dont think its totally Republican-dominated, Lesmeister said.

When you look at the number of registered Democrats, independents and things like that across our state and how conservative our legislature has swung, it doesnt represent the state in the way that I think we should, and you see that when we pass things like the marijuana bill that passes, Smith said. Thats a fairly liberal idea, right, not just to do medical but also do recreational in the same sweep.

I think the Democrats have gotten behind what the public wants to do, and weve championed their cause, said Democratic Rep. Shawn Bordeaux of Mission.

And as Keintz points out, a stance on an issue doesnt have to be partisan.

Its not always just a strictly Democrat/Republican viewpoint on a lot of issues, so I dont always see it just on strict party lines with everything, Keintz said. You know there are some things that dont have to do with only party, but I do think that some of the ideas are getting lost or not really being elevated because we do have a small number.

11 is a comparably small number, but its neither lonely nor insignificant.

There may be only eight of us in the House, but, three in the Senate, but they still count, Lesmeister said.

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What its like to be a Democrat in the South Dakota state legislature - KELOLAND.com

The companys payday foreshadows how the entire cannabis industry is poised for growth and consolidation as Democrats take full control of the federal government. Companies are positioning themselves for the greater likelihood that federal cannabis restrictions will be loosened significantly.

Sales are already booming. Cannabis sales hit $20 billion last year a 50 percent jump over 2019. Legalization continues to spread across the country, with more than one-third of Americans now living in states where marijuana is fully legal.

There's no stopping the industry now, said Andrew Kline, who recently joined the law firm Perkins Coie after serving as public policy director for the National Cannabis Industry Association. The bigger players are going to be interested in acquiring smaller companies and becoming multi-state operators or expanding their footprint in different states.

A flurry of deals and capital raises have been made in recent weeks, in addition to Curaleaf cashing in.

Cannabis behemoth Cresco Labs recently bought Bluma Wellness for $213 million, giving it a beachhead in the booming Florida market. There are now more than 450,000 medical marijuana patients in Florida a more than 50 percent increase in the last year and 310 dispensaries across the state, nearly 100 more than at the start of 2020.

I think you're gonna see a lot of [mergers and acquisitions] coming, said Bluma Wellness CEO Brady Cobb, who will join Cresco immediately and focus on building its Florida business. It's going to be driven by the fact that institutional capital sees light at the end of the tunnel for these companies.

Cresco also recently announced it will raise $125 million from investors, citing plans to accelerate its growth. The company was already soaring ahead of the political shifts: It had third-quarter revenues of $153 million more than four times as much as during the comparable period in 2019.

Canadian companies also are eyeing the U.S. market. Cannabis giant Canopy Growth Corp. recently announced a deal contingent on U.S. legalization to acquire a big stake in TerrAscend, which has operations in California, Pennsylvania and New Jersey.

The deal is similar to Canopys arrangement to buy Acreage Holdings, which has 71 dispensaries and operations in 15 states, if marijuana restrictions in the U.S. are lifted.

Stock prices for some of the biggest cannabis companies have skyrocketed in recent weeks. Acreages stock price has nearly doubled since Democrats won control of the Senate, while the price of Crescos shares have jumped by more than 30 percent.

People are scrambling right now, and they're taking a calculated risk that federal change is going to happen in the near term, Kline said.

Despite the ebullient feelings among industry advocates and investors, the likelihood that Congress will make big changes to federal marijuana restrictions remains slim. Thats in large part because Democrats will have a razor-thin majority and need 60 votes to pass most legislation.

Thats why, despite the Houses passage of the MORE Act in the last Congress which would federally decriminalize cannabis and expunge records many in the weed industry have their sights set on banking legislation in the new Congress. The SAFE Banking Act which would make it easier for banks to offer financial services to the cannabis industry passed the House with broad bipartisan support in 2019, but went nowhere in the GOP-controlled Senate.

With Democrats now in charge of both chambers, industry insiders and policy experts believe banking has a good shot at becoming law and a much better shot than comprehensive legalization legislation. Even the incoming ranking member on the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee, GOP Sen. Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, said hes open to discussing the issue.

We're not going to get full scale legalization from this Senate, said John Hudak, a cannabis policy expert at The Brookings Institution.

High-quality coverage of one of the fastest growing industries in the country. Sign up for a free preview.

Hudak, however, isnt surprised by the jump in cannabis stocks following the Georgia runoff.

There's a real problem within the business community about an avoidance of working with people who truly understand how federal legislative politics works, Hudak said. And there is also a serious problem of lobbyists and others committing political malpractice in selling these businesses a really bad basket of goods.

Despite the post-election stock market jump and Curaleafs own fundraising success, Jordan said he agrees with Hudaks overall assessment. He doesnt believe marijuana legalization is likely to pass this Congress, and his business decisions are still motivated more by state policy changes.

We're making very large bets, Jordan said. Not based on federal legal changes, but based on what we're seeing the population do at the ballot box.

The legalization boom continues to spread across the country. Voters in Arizona, New Jersey, Montana and South Dakota approved ballot measures to legalize, tax and regulate recreational marijuana in November. Altogether, that means 18 million more Americans now live in states where the drug is fully legal.

State legislatures across the country are eyeing legalization too, at least in part because of big budget deficits caused by the pandemic. New York, Virginia, Connecticut and New Mexico are among the states where there will be strong pushes to pass recreational legalization bills in the coming weeks.

Even relatively mature markets saw huge growth in 2020, fueled by anxious Americans stuck in their homes smoking more weed. Sales in Colorado topped $2 billion for the first time, while Oregon saw a 40 percent spike in revenues.

Companies are doubling [and] tripling in size so that they can keep up with demand, Trulieve CEO Kim Rivers said. Trulieve is the biggest player in Floridas medical marijuana market, with a growing footprint around the country. At the end of the day, there's still incredible opportunity, even if that doesn't immediately translate into full federal legalization.

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Theres no stopping the industry now: Democratic control is a big win for marijuana - POLITICO

The last time the U.S. economy suffered a crisis and needed an injection from the federal government, the Democratic Party was fighting with itself over how big rescue legislation should be.

There were those who thought something really huge over $1 trillion was necessary to get the country back on track after the 2008 financial crisis. But plenty of others believed an amount that high not only wasnt necessary, but was a political loser. Democrats didnt want to give Republicans any more ammunition to attack them as profligate spenders. Obama adviser Larry Summers actually forbade one of his colleagues from so much as presenting Obama with an option that topped $1 trillion.

Since then, a consensus has emerged among economists that President Barack Obamas 2009 stimulus package, which ended up costing roughly $840 billion, greatly benefited the economy but should have gone much further. It essentially was big enough to anger Republicans but not big enough to fully get the job done for the economy.

The lessons from that fight, as well as the negotiations over the Affordable Care Act, are now shaping the $1.9 trillion stimulus package that President Joe Biden has offered to help the country recover from the coronavirus pandemic.

The takeaways for Democrats are clear: 1) Go big, and 2) dont wait around forever for Republicans to get on board.

The history of fiscal interventions has shown us that the tendency is to go small rather than to go big. If you listen to not just the president, but Janet Yellen, who has a fair bit of experience with this sort of thing, the risk here is not doing too much, its doing too little, said Jared Bernstein, a member of the presidents Council of Economic Advisers.

The lesson of 2009 is repeated and respected even among the colleagues who werent here at the time, said Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), who was his states attorney general at the time.

If you remember 2009, we know that package was too small. It being so small, it caused the economy to recover a lot more slowly, added Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.).

Biden is dealing with a different Senate than Obama did at the start of his first term. Obama had a bigger majority, but there were more than half a dozen moderates he needed to please to get anything done. Biden has a Senate divided 50-50, but there are far fewer moderates.

Biden has expressed an interest in bipartisanship, but so far, he is indicating much more willing to move forward quickly without the GOP than Obama was.

The mood has also shifted. The country appears far more unified around the idea of doing something big on coronavirus than it was on the earlier financial crisis.

In early 2009, support for an $800 billion stimulus package hovered in the 50s, with a third or fewer of Republicans expressing support. Surveys that summer that asked Americans to weigh between stimulus spending and deficit reduction found the public anywhere from near-evenly divided to substantially preferring the latter.

A survey taken this year found Americans prioritizing economic recovery and dealing with the coronavirus outbreak significantly ahead of deficit reduction. In June 2020, as the nation settled in for a long haul with the pandemic, a 57% majority of registered voters wanted the government to do more, rather than leaving things up to businesses and individuals.

The progressive groups Data for Progress and Invest in America released a poll Wednesday that found 68% of voters want emergency relief as soon as possible, and 55% say to move forward with only Democratic votes, if necessary.

Voters have been pleading for help since last spring, and with Republicans in power, it fell on deaf ears. The distinction, today, between which party is interested in digging out from this, and which party wants to sit on their hands isnt an argument we have to make or win; it is the premise of Democratic trifecta, said Eric Schultz, who was communications director of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee from 2009-2010 and later worked in the Obama White House, referring to the Democratic control of the House, Senate and White House.

Even moderate senators from 2009 say that the current moment calls for substantial action.

This kind of trickling of the money doesnt give the boost that the economy needs at this time. Im kind of a go big or go home type of person, said Mark Begich, a former Democratic senator from Alaska who is now a strategic consulting adviser with the lobbying and law firm Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck.

Begich was one of the moderate Democrats who wanted the Obama administration to cap the 2009 legislation at $800 billion. He said the overall number was getting way too big to manage and expressed concerns about some of the items included in the bill.

But he argues that the magnitude of what the country now faces is so much greater than after the 2008 financial crisis.

We didnt have a worldwide pandemic several hundred thousand people in this country that have died. To be frank with you, that is the significant difference. Its not just an economic urgency which it was last time, only economics. This is health first, he said.

Current Democratic lawmakers from more moderate districts are also, so far, largely on board with Bidens strategy in no small part because of what happened in 2009.

As a moderate Democrat representing a swing seat outside Pittsburgh, Rep. Conor Lamb is the type of lawmaker who may have been concerned about the size of the stimulus package in 2009. But he immediately blasted the Senate Republicans counterproposal in a Twitter thread in which he stated that unity doesnt determine the outcome here.

An important lesson after 2008 was that the stimulus efforts were probably too small, he told HuffPost. If we know now, that the COVID-19 shock is greater than 2008, our efforts should be bigger and stronger.

Lamb, whose constituents voted for Donald Trump in 2016, also believes that a bigger recovery package is the smarter play politically. Whether it was deserved or not, Lamb believes that high growth and rising pay in the pre-pandemic economy contributed to Trumps unexpectedly strong performance this past November.

Our job is to give people that same feeling, but in a way that hits the middle class and working people even more, he said. Do it so that people really feel it.

Rep. Matt Cartwright, another Pennsylvania Democrat in a swing seat, also emphasized the importance of bold action.

The door for a bipartisan package is open, but we are the Democratic majority for a reason, Cartwright said in a statement. We are not about to keep the American people waiting for the relief they need and demand.

Still, there are details where not everyone is in agreement, and the package could be downsized.

Some Democrats have started to discusslimiting the number of peoplewho receive the next round of stimulus checks, by lowering the annual income threshold above which people no longer receive the full payment.

This more targeted approach would be a way for the White House and Democrats to lower costs show theyre willing to negotiate, but it would also deprive more Americans of assistance and its unclear whether it would actually attract any Republican votes to the overall legislation.

Rep. Cheri Bustos (D-Ill.) oversaw the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee,charged with expanding the partys majority in the House. She also represents a district Donald Trump won in both 2016 and 2020, and said the biggest risk for the Democratic majority is not delivering significant aid to Americans.

You are a fool if you dont learn from mistakes. And there were mistakes that were made during the great recession, Bustos said.

House Democrats saw their majority shrink by more than a dozen seats in the 2020 elections. Bustos said that while there will be pressure on those remaining Democrats from swing districts to show bipartisan appeal, that concern shouldnt supersede passing the necessary relief.

Well listen, and theres some wiggle room on some of this, but in the end, we need to deliver, Bustos said, saying that she and fellow Democrats met with Biden over a Zoom call Wednesday morning. For the proposal from our friends across the aisle to not include one penny of help for our towns all over this country, that part of it is a nonstarter.

Bustos said that on the call, Biden emphasized the urgency of acting quickly and while there might be some negotiations on individual elements of the package, hes committed to moving forward with a big, aggressive package.

Evan Vucci/Associated PresPresident Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris meet with Republican lawmakers to discuss a coronavirus relief package in the Oval Office of the White House on Feb. 1. From left, Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah, Harris, Biden, and Sen. Susan Collins of Maine.

On Monday, Biden met with 10 Republican senators who pushed for a smaller stimulus package that would total $600 billion. It would offer smaller checks to people, no aid for state and local governments and less unemployment insurance. The president is under pressure to live up to his promise of uniting the country, with Republicans arguing that if he truly wants to do so, he needs to get their support for this package.

In an ideal world, everyone would like the coronavirus stimulus package to be bipartisan. The question is, how much time and energy should Biden spend on getting Republicans on board?

For most Democrats, the answer is easy: Dont spend all that much.

Former Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) was a key architect of the Affordable Care Act and, as chairman of the Finance Committee, presided over months of negotiations with Republicans to win support for a bill. The effort seemed increasingly futile to almost everybody else, but he stuck with it, despite pleas from both colleagues on Capitol Hill and officials at the White House.

No matter how hard we pressed ... we couldnt get Baucus to complete his work, Obama wrote in his memoir. Although one Republican senator (Maines Olympia Snowe) voted for a bill in committee, none supported it on the floor.

Baucus said he has no regrets, because he believes bipartisan legislation is ultimately more politically sustainable something essential for a program that will, ideally, exist in perpetuity. But the rescue package is mostly about short-term, time-limited interventions, and the nature of the pandemic means that Biden doesnt have time for months of negotiations.

I dont think he has much time. Hes got to decide pretty quickly, Baucus said, regarding whether Biden will work with Republicans. The virus is spreading, the different strains, such a huge issue. And if he wants his presidency to succeed clearly he does he has to lead. He has to be president. He has to not get bogged down in negotiations.

Claire McCaskill, a former moderate Democratic senator from Missouri who was also around in 2009, tweeted on Tuesday that as long as the White House focuses on policies that have broad public bipartisan support, they can be less concerned about politicians bipartisan support.

So far, the Biden administration is largely standing firm on its $1.9 trillion package. Their argument is that they dont need Republican lawmakers votes on their package since what they are proposing currently appears to be very popular among the American public, even among Republican voters.

This is a bipartisan agenda, White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain tweeted Tuesday, sharing a poll that showed two-thirds of Americans favored Bidens $1.9 trillion proposal.

Biden told Senate Democrats this week that he believed the size of the GOP senators counterproposal was too small.

And the consistent message from the administration has been that there is a need to act aggressively to avert further disaster.

[R]ight now, with interest rates at historic lows, the smartest thing we can do is act big, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said at her confirmation hearing last month. In the long run, I believe the benefits will far outweigh the costs, especially if we care about helping people who have been struggling for a very long time.

Jim Manley, who served as a top aide to then-Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) during the 2009 negotiations, said he gives Biden significant credit for, so far, refusing to buckle to the Republican demands.

They staked out a position and started driving a message on Friday that they were going to go big, and they havent walked away from that at all including during these negotiations with the Republicans, said Manley, who is now a senior adviser with APCO Worldwide. I think its very encouraging. They are determined to avoid the mistakes of the past.

Democrats are continuing to message that theyre willing to work with Republicans on this emergency package, but in Congress theyve already taken the first step toward passing the relief without Republican support. This week, Senate Democrats voted to approve a budget resolution that would allow for $1.9 trillion in new spending through a special process called budget reconciliation.

Budget reconciliation bills can pass with only the backing of a simple majority, meaning every Democrat will have to be on board, and Vice President Kamala Harris will have to step in as the tie-breaking vote.

The loudest moderate Democratic voice in the Senate so far has been Sen. Joe Manchin (W.Va.), who previously grumbled that $1.9 trillion was maybe too high but ultimately accepted the number as an upper limit. Hes made clear that he wont sign on to nonemergency proposals being pushed through reconciliation,opposes the $15 an hour minimum wage included in Bidens initial proposal and wants further narrowing of how many Americans would receive the direct payments in the proposal.

On MSNBC Wednesday morning, Manchin said Biden told him that he does not want a repeat of what happened in 2009, when Democrats negotiated with Republicans for months on the Affordable Care Act and essentially came out with nothing.

I said, fine, Mr. President. Im happy to start this process, Manchin said, adding that he was not willing to change the rules of the Senate like abolishing the filibuster.

Some veterans of more collegial lawmaking eras also still see inherent value in at least making a good-faith effort to unite the two parties. Former Sen. Evan Bayh, a moderate Indiana Democrat active in the 2009 stimulus negotiations, argues that the key question is whether Biden can court Republican support without undermining his core policy goals.

There is a danger in moving too slowly say, longer than a few weeks but also a political risk in moving too fast, Bayh said.

The economy needs help, so you do need to move expeditiously, said Bayh, who is currently a senior adviser to the private equity firm Apollo Global Management.

But, he added, If you just go out and put the hammer down immediately within a day or two, people will misjudge the man. Joe Biden would genuinely love bipartisan cooperation.

Rep. Charlie Crist (D-Fla.), who was the Republican governor of the Sunshine State in 2009, effectively ended his career in the GOP when he welcomed Obama to an event in the state touting the states stimulus money. Crist and Obama shared a hug that Marco Rubio would use to attack Crist in the Republican Senate primary in 2010, prompting Crist to become an independent and subsequently a Democrat.

Crist, who made calls to Maine Sen. Susan Collins (R) to get her on board with the stimulus package in 2009, believes that Obama got it just right.

I pray for a bipartisan bill this time too, Crist said, though he admitted hes not certain it will occur.

As for concerns about the size of the stimulus then, Crist said, President Obama probably would have liked for it to have been more. But one thing Ive learned in my public service is its better to get half a loaf than no loaf at all.

And at least one former Democratic lawmaker who served during Obamas first term warned in no uncertain terms against dispensing with the partys historic concerns for fiscal prudence and bipartisanship.

Going big isnt consistent with what the president was proposing when he said, We want to do things in a combined way in other words, reaching across to Republicans, said former Sen. Ben Nelson, a Nebraska Democrat, who proved one of the toughest Democratic votes to get in support of the Affordable Care Act and now practices corporate law at the Omaha firm Lamson Dugan & Murray. He said hes president of everybody, not just those who voted for him. So its hard to have it both ways.

The White House is banking on the belief that the American public isnt focused on the budgetary process and the inside negotiations. They simply want to see results.

What I think people are thinking about is we are almost a year into a crisis that has yet to be adequately controlled because of the lack of a focused and concentrated effort in the prior administration, said Bernstein, adding, What the American people want to see is action of scale that accomplishes three things: control the virus, distribute the vaccine and launch a reliably robust recovery.

Igor Bobic, Jonathan Cohn and Ariel Edwards-Levy contributed reporting.

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Democrats Determined To Avoid Their Old Mistakes With Big COVID-19 Stimulus - HuffPost