Not Content with Ruining Health Care Reform, Baucus Now After Jobs Bill
Someone go throw this guy off a mountain or something:
Democrats from the president on down say jobs are their No. 1 priority, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid expects to announce details of a bill this week. But a squabble among Senate Democrats is complicating early efforts to bring a bill to the floor…
And when they walked into a meeting in the office of Reid (D-Nev.) on Jan. 22, they thought they were about to cross the finish line — the Dorgan-Durbin plan would be blessed by the small group of senators in the room, presented to the full Democratic Caucus on Jan. 28 and then taken straight to the floor for a vote.
But Montana Sen. Max Baucus had other ideas.
The chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, where the health care bill was debated for months last year, surprised the senators gathered in Reid’s office by suggesting he wanted a chance to mark up portions of the bill under his committee’s jurisdiction before it went to the floor, according to several people who attended the meeting.
Here we go again: get ready for months of delays, fruitless efforts to get Republicans to support a bill they hate by gutting the bill, and an epic fail at the end.
Now is not the time to let an incompetent and corrupt (really corrupt) small state Senator ruin another presidential goal. The country is already underwater for the next ten years:
By President Obama’s own optimistic projections, American deficits will not return to what are widely considered sustainable levels over the next 10 years. In fact, in 2019 and 2020 — years after Mr. Obama has left the political scene, even if he serves two terms — they start rising again sharply, to more than 5 percent of gross domestic product. His budget draws a picture of a nation that like many American homeowners simply cannot get above water.
For Mr. Obama and his successors, the effect of those projections is clear: Unless miraculous growth, or miraculous political compromises, creates some unforeseen change over the next decade, there is virtually no room for new domestic initiatives for Mr. Obama or his successors.
…and those of us who don’t receive enormous contributions from the insurance industry need all the help we can get.
Seriously, someone needs to show Max baucus the door, and quickly.
