If you haven't heard of the reconciliation bill, then you probably have been in forced isolation for the past three months. The recon bill, a hotly debated piece of legislation that is consuming most of the media's time right now, is $3.5 trillion worth of wish list that is about half of what the progressive Democrats want, and about $2 trillion more than the moderate Demarcates want. To pass the House, it will have to change.

Since nobody knows what the particulars are in the bill, everyone talks in generalities. It is time for Congress to put meat on the bones and tell us how much we are spending and on what. With concrete numbers, it would be easier to separate out all the energy/climate pieces so they could do a separate climate change bill that all the Democrats would be in favor of and even some Republicans.

That would make the rest of the reconciliation bill smaller and easier to swallow for moderate Democratic congressmen, leaving a stand-alone climate change piece to go through as its own bill, forcing all legislators take a stand on climate. We can watch the lobbyists scramble to kill the bill and see who takes their money. Joe Manchin's open-door policy has seen a steady stream of lobbyists pour through. Will he change his stance on fossil fuel? Or will he finally capitulate so everyone wins.

David Deick

Atascadero