Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) gestures outside the Senate chamber on January 24, 2020 in Washington, D.C.
Mario Tama/Getty Images
China had a great Donald Trump era experience. It did not look that way, given the former U.S. president’s trade war, Twitter tirades and general anti-China bombast.
Below the surface, though, China was able to project itself as the stabler power as Trump upended global institutions. President Xi Jinping used the Trumpian chaos to conclude history’s biggest trade deal. Beijing harnessed its “Belt and Road” initiative and Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank to curry favor everywhere. Trump, meanwhile, did zero to raise America’s economic game, playing right into Xi’s hands.
Now, Joe Manchin is helping to make 2021 a year that China won, too. By suddenly torpedoing President Joe Biden’s roughly $2 trillion Build Back Better Plan, the senator from West Virginia is…
