Despite their best efforts, Democrats are getting things done

Plus: Zombie robot spiders. [Bloomberg]( Follow Us [Get the newsletter]( This is Bloomberg Opinion Today, a houseboat of Bloomberg Opinion’s opinions. [Sign up here](. Today’s Agenda - The [Manchin deal is a big deal](. - The Fed may [not stay in neutral](. - Germany has [lost some moral high ground](. - [The Walmart effect]( may be spreading. Ain’t No Manchin High Enough A good working theory of the universe is “Everything is getting stupider, faster.” But its corollary — or maybe refutation? — is “Nobody knows anything.” This means sometimes non-stupid things happen when you least expect them. Take Joe Manchin. The 47th president of the United States is a mystery wrapped in a riddle inside a Crunchwrap Supreme of an enigma. He lives on a houseboat like a 1970s TV detective but drives a Maserati like a 2010s movie villain. He is the Senate swing vote for a party dedicated to fighting climate change, but he craves coal harder than Thomas the Tank Engine. For much of the past two years, Manchin has enraged every Democrat to the left of Joe Lieberman by repeatedly frustrating Co-President Joe Biden’s policy goals. Then, like a bolt of lightning on a West Virginia mountain, he agreed to vote for a decent-sized bundle of those goals, possibly [out-Mitch McConnelling Mitch McConnell]( in the process. Passage of this bill would [deliver some big policy changes Dems have sought]( for years, including a minimum corporate tax rate, the death of the carried-interest tax loophole, and Medicare negotiation of drug prices — all while lowering the deficit. It is, as Bloomberg’s editorial board writes, “a big effing deal.” Those revenue-raisers more than pay for [a sizable investment in clean technology](, notes Liam Denning. It’s no Green New Deal, but it is the kind of momentum-booster the country’s energy transition needs — and has the vote of the senator from the great state of Bituminous. Manchin is not the only surprising actor here. The whole 117th Congress has shockingly been [one of the most productive in half a century](, notes Jonathan Bernstein. Even if this deal doesn’t pass, we’ve already gotten bipartisan deals on stimulus, infrastructure, gun control and election reform, to name a few. With that in mind, maybe it’s time to re-evaluate Biden, whose approval rating is now small enough to fit on the head of a pin. Maybe he’s a potted plant in the room where it happens, or maybe he’s so in harmony with his natural habitat of Washington that he’s the only one who knows how to get all these swamp creatures to work together to get things done. Is the Fed Done or Nah? After swinging the Fed’s comically large interest-rate hammer and trying to make the RECESSION bell on the strongman game go ding yesterday, Chairman Jay [Powell suggested rates are now at a “neutral” level](. That means they’re neither too high nor too low. Markets agreed, rallying hard, but Mohamed El-Erian isn’t so sure. He has been disturbingly right about this stuff for a while, so govern yourselves accordingly. We’d better hope Powell is right, honestly, because more market and economic chaos could ensue otherwise. And to be fair, Powell did say a lot of hawkish stuff implying [rates were going to blow past this neutral level]( to an even higher neutral level, writes Jonathan Levin. Neutral Plus, if you will. The tricky thing is that the economy might already be in a [recession](, considering GDP has now [shrunk]( for two consecutive quarters. Meanwhile, all over the world, [commodity supplies are rising and prices are falling](, notes David Fickling (in our new energy newsletter, for which you can [sign up]( here. It’s inflation-proof, meaning it’s free). Neutrality is a constantly moving target, like Coinbase’s stock price. What’s the German Word for ‘Comeuppance’? Germany gave us “schadenfreude,” and now it’s experiencing the business end of the concept. Its long-standing foreign policy of pandering to Russia has resulted in Russia holding the whole continent hostage with a natural-gas pipeline. Suffering most of all is Germany, which needs that sweet, sweet gas to power its factories. It has suggested Europe’s “southern” states share its pain, to which those states have responded by wondering where Germany’s sense of solidarity was a decade ago, when its only response to their financial crisis was “stop whining” (“hör auf zu jammern”). Maria Tadeo writes [Germany has frittered away its moral leadership]( of the continent, which could be a good thing for the long-term strength of its union. Bonus Ukraine War Reading: Vladimir [Putin’s war goals seem to be expanding](, but they’re really a sign of his defensiveness. — Leonid Bershidsky Telltale Charts [Consumer goods companies are passing on higher prices]( for now, but Walmart’s experience suggests they won’t get away with it much longer, writes Andrea Felsted. Coinbase and other denizens of the cryptoverse are not prepared for the [long, dark winter of perfectly normal securities regulation]( they face, writes Lionel Laurent. Further Reading China must do [more than apply short-term balm]( to its property market. It must end Covid Zero policies. — Bloomberg’s editorial board [Jack Ma is better off]( spending more time with his billions than enduring the hassle of running Ant. — Shuli Ren [Tunisia’s president is killing its democracy](, and the US is doing nothing to stop it. — Bobby Ghosh Rather than [lecturing poor nations for producing and burning]( fossil fuels, rich nations should give them money. — Mihir Sharma Covid nasal sprays may fit like a bullet up your nose, but [they will not be a magic bullet](. — Therese Raphael and Sam Fazeli America’s big banks are [turning your deposit dollars into climate misery]( by funding polluters. — Tanja Hester ICYMI [Biden pulled Xi Jinping]( for a chat. House Democrats reportedly plan to [ban stock ownership by lawmakers](. Hybrid cars [face extinction](. A Manhattan block near Bloomingdale’s is [frozen in peak pandemic time](. Kickers DeepMind’s protein-folding AI just [predicted the structure of all known proteins](. Social media is [undermining democracy](. Area man wakes up after night on sleeper train only to [find it never left the station](. [Notre Dame is being restored](. Again. Researchers turn dead spiders into “[necrobiotic grippers](” for some reason. Notes: Please send zombie robot spiders and complaints to Mark Gongloff at mgongloff1@bloomberg.net. [Sign up here]( and follow us on [Instagram](, [TikTok](, [Twitter]( and [Facebook](. Like getting this newsletter? [Subscribe to Bloomberg.com]( for unlimited access to trusted, data-driven journalism and subscriber-only insights. 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