Reid to Baucus: Stop Chasing GOP Votes on Health Care

[Lief 🗽]

Fucking finally.

http://www.rollcall.com/news/36546-1.html

Reid to Baucus: Stop Chasing GOP Votes on Health Care
July 7, 2009, 5:35 p.m.
By David M. Drucker and Emily Pierce
Roll Call Staff

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) on Tuesday ordered Finance Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) to drop a proposal to tax health benefits and stop chasing Republican votes on a massive health care reform bill.

Reid, whose leadership is considered crucial if President Barack Obama is to deliver on his promise of enacting health care reform this year, offered the directive to Baucus through an intermediary after consulting with Senate Democratic leaders during Tuesday morning’s regularly scheduled leadership meeting. Baucus was meeting with Finance ranking member Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) Tuesday afternoon to relay the information.

According to Democratic sources, Reid told Baucus that taxing health benefits and failing to include a strong government-run insurance option of some sort in his bill would cost 10 to 15 Democratic votes; Reid told Baucus it wasn’t worth securing the support of Grassley and at best a few additional Republicans.

By Tuesday afternoon, the Finance Committee began looking at ways other than taxing health benefits to deliver a health care overhaul that costs less than $1 trillion and is deficit-neutral, as Baucus wants.

“This was discussed in the weekly Democratic leadership meeting,” one Democratic source confirmed Tuesday afternoon. “These concerns were relayed to [Baucus] later on.”

Baucus for months has worked with Grassley on a health care reform bill that could garner bipartisan support. But the Finance chairman was forced last month to delay the markup of his committee’s bill because such a compromise remained elusive.

The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee is set to complete the markup of its health care reform legislation this week or next. One senior Democratic Senate aide warned Tuesday that further delays by the Finance Committee could result in the planned merger of the two panels’ bills being scrapped in favor of allowing each one to move to the floor on its own.

The HELP bill is unanimously supported by the panel’s Democrats, with all Republicans opposed. It was drafted with liberal reform goals in mind, including health care policies that many Democrats have sought for decades.

“The longer Baucus takes, the trickier it gets,” the senior Democratic Senate aide said.

[Bono]

Didn't Landrieu said she wouldn't support a government plan? And Specter and Wyden?

[Swing low, sweet chariot. Comin' for to carry me home.]

By Tuesday afternoon, the Finance Committee began looking at ways other than taxing health benefits to deliver a health care overhaul that costs less than $1 trillion and is deficit-neutral, as Baucus wants.

in other words:  A $1,000,000,000,000.00 TAX INCREASE

just what an ailing economy needs

[Lief 🗽]

Didn't Landrieu said she wouldn't support a government plan? And Specter and Wyden?

Specter flip-flopped and has said he will now support a public plan. I don't know that Landrieu has definitively said no, but it wouldn't surprise me. Did Wyden say he wouldn't support a public plan? I know he's working on his own thing, but I don't think he's come out against it.

Anyway, in the article, it says that there are 10-15 Democratic senators who would not support a bill unless it had a public plan (not to mention the progressive bloc in the House).

[Sam Spade]

By Tuesday afternoon, the Finance Committee began looking at ways other than taxing health benefits to deliver a health care overhaul that costs less than $1 trillion and is deficit-neutral, as Baucus wants.

in other words:  A $1,000,000,000,000.00 TAX INCREASE

just what an ailing economy needs

I thought you said things were going to turn around in 3-4 months?

[Marokai Backbeat]

Fucking finally.

By Tuesday afternoon, the Finance Committee began looking at ways other than taxing health benefits to deliver a health care overhaul that costs less than $1 trillion and is deficit-neutral, as Baucus wants.

in other words:  A $1,000,000,000,000.00 TAX INCREASE

just what an ailing economy needs

lol

[Torie]

Can the Dems round up 60 votes on this one doing their own thing I wonder?

[The Dowager Mod]

They don't need 60 votes just 51, budget reconciliation.

[Torie]

They don't need 60 votes just 51, budget reconciliation.

It seems dubious to me that a health care plan could be slipped into the budget in that way, to avoid a cloture vote. If it happens, the filibuster will be largely dead in the future. That bothered Senator Harry Reid once, when it was about judges, but well, the opportunist sees his openings and runs like a bat out of hell to slip through them.

[Holmes]

Oh Landrieu. You only have 5.5 years left anyway, just vote with your party. It's not like you have a shot at re-election.

[Rob]

Oh Landrieu. You only have 5.5 years left anyway, just vote with your party. It's not like you have a shot at re-election.

Good rule of thumb: being a southern "populist" actually means sabotaging any kind of reform and doing whatever your rich donors tell you to.

[Holmes]

Doesn't Wal-Mart support Obama's plan though? If Pryor and Lincoln vote for it and she doesn't, well... that'll be just sad.

[Purple State]

Fucking finally indeed! It's time the Republicans know that they cannot hold every bill hostage by pulling the, "b-b-b-but you said bipartisanship!" card. Enough is enough.

Reconciliation or not, I hope Reid and Obama push senators to simply vote to close debate on the Democratic agenda. They can vote against the bill if they would like, but just close debate with the 60 we have. Few enough Americans understand what these procedural votes mean anyway and it would be difficult to throw them into campaign ads when they can point to a concrete vote against the bill.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

Baucus just sucks. He thinks that powerful lobbyists help America, and he voted to end the estate tax. He has to truly be nuts for even Reid to lose patience with him.

As for Reid,

[Lief 🗽]

They don't need 60 votes just 51, budget reconciliation.

It seems dubious to me that a health care plan could be slipped into the budget in that way, to avoid a cloture vote. If it happens, the filibuster will be largely dead in the future. That bothered Senator Harry Reid once, when it was about judges, but well, the opportunist sees his openings and runs like a bat out of hell to slip through them.

Well, first of all, the budget can't be filibustered, and the money for the health care plan was set aside in the budget, but not actually specified (so, ~650 billion to pay for "universal health care reform" with the understanding that a bill would be passed later to define what exactly that is). Indeed, the CBO's estimate for the Senate HELP committee's plan actually shows it costing less than the money set aside for it in the budget (the HELP committee's plan includes a public option, though it's a little weaker than the one written by the House).

Second, health care spending was, if I remember correctly, one of the only things in the budget that was approved for reconciliation. Cap and trade, for instance, will be able to be filibustered, as Reid didn't have the votes to approve it for reconciliation. So, don't worry Torie, the losers of the last election filibustering the winners of the last election is still alive and safe.

Oh Landrieu. You only have 5.5 years left anyway, just vote with your party. It's not like you have a shot at re-election.

Good rule of thumb: being a southern "populist" actually means sabotaging any kind of reform and doing whatever your rich donors tell you to.

This whole idea of an economically liberal/socially conservative Southern populist seems to be a myth, as far as I can tell. I don't know of any that exist in the Congress, and I can only think of a few historically (George Wallace being the main one). These so-called "populists" all act like Republican-lite corporate hacks.

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

Can the Dems round up 60 votes on this one doing their own thing I wonder?

I don't see it happening.

[Lief 🗽]

Getting 57 Democratic votes to 60 is easier than getting 48 Democratic votes + 4 Republican votes to 60, I would think. (Made up, approximate numbers)