Why Democrats don't cry "DINO"

Because Democrats don’t claim that fellow Democrats with whom they disagree are not actually Democrats, they are able to hold and use power to a degree that the GOP cannot. Here’s an obvious case in point: Joe Manchin of West Virginia, a Democrat, prevented President Biden from getting Congress to adopt his Build Back Better plan — a $5 trillion monstrosity that would have changed this country had it been passed — almost single-handedly. Although Manchin was attacked by activists on the Left, we didn’t hear Democrats in Congress or otherwise holding official party positions calling Manchin a DINO. They recognized — somewhat reluctantly, to be sure — that he was still a member of their party, and among other things had voted to organize the Senate under Democratic control.

And what came of that? President Biden was recently able to claim a success with a destructive new law called the Inflation Reduction Act. It doesn’t reduce inflation, but it does double the size of the Internal Revenue Service and, according to independent studies, adds taxes for virtually every American. To the Democrats, that’s a success, and they can credit it to Senator Manchin, whom they did not attempt to exclude from their party.

On Capitol Hill, Democratic lawmakers worked with Manchin to find common ground, and eventually were able to claim some kind of victory. To many Americans who just want a functioning government, that may be enough to urge them to vote for the Democrats instead of the GOP in the upcoming midterms.