I have to admit, Biden's two-track strategy on the infrastructure legislation never made any sense to me at all. Sure, crafting a bipartisan compromise bill which stripped away more of the really good stuff to the ten Republican votes it would need to avoid a filibuster and then passing all the good stuff that was stripped away in a separate "reconciliation" bill that only needed 50 votes and so could be passed with just Democrats would get us to the result I wanted. But why would any Republicans sign on to the bipartisan first part if they knew about the second part? Anything the Democrats offered to remove from the bipartisan bill would just be added to a bill that would be passed right afterwards, so what's in it for the Republicans to get it removed from the bipartisan bill? If getting something they hate removed from the bill while knowing the hated proposal will be enacted into law in a separate bill, they still will end up with a hated law. How does removal benefit them at all? Why would it buy off a single Republican vote?
I guess this is another indication that Republicans really don't give a shit about policy. Sure, their official position is that they hate the policies in the reconciliation bill, but all they really care about is that they can say they voted against it. They will knowingly cooperate in a scheme knowing it will result in the hated stuff's passage so long as they can vote against it.
