Word: baucus
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...just because his constituents badly need health-care reform - 16% of West Virginians are uninsured - but also because his amendment to the Senate Finance Committee's current health-reform bill was doomed to fail. It was voted down, 15 to 8, with five Democrats - including committee chairman Max Baucus - joining all 10 Republicans on the committee in opposition. Baucus, who agrees with Rockefeller that a public option would save the Federal Government money and lower costs for consumers, nonetheless believes that a bill with such an option will not garner enough support to overcome the threat of a filibuster...
...despite evidence that Baucus is right - currently the Senate does not have 60 public-option supporters - the public option may not be dead yet. A subsequent public-option amendment offered by New York Senator Charles Schumer called for negotiated reimbursement rates - in contrast to Rockefeller's amendment, which would have pegged reimbursements to Medicare rates for the first two years - and as a result garnered support from two Democrats whose position was not previously known, Senators Bill Nelson and Thomas Carper. It still failed, 13 to 10, but the new tally indicated that there may be some room to negotiate...
...Even if the Baucus bill bears Snowe's stamp, that does not mean it will get her vote. She stood with Republicans when they demanded that Baucus submit his vast measure to full scoring by the Congressional Budget Office to ensure that everyone knew what it would cost. Nor has she said she will support the bill's individual mandate, which would require people who are not covered by their employers or by government programs to buy coverage for themselves, just as car owners in nearly every state must have auto insurance. Without such a requirement, the bill is likely...
...legislation," she says. "We never could reach a consensus and move beyond the barriers that had developed on both sides of the political aisle." Snowe now says that effort was a "formative event" in her approach to health-care policy - which no doubt explains why Finance Committee chairman Max Baucus made sure that what she wanted back then has been resurrected and transplanted virtually intact in his bill...
...Snowe has been working behind the scenes to remedy a problem that she was among the first to identify and that is now at the heart of the debate: how to make coverage affordable. Snowe began arguing months ago with Baucus - and with President Barack Obama - that if the government was going to require people to buy health insurance, it had better also make sure they had the means to do so. Early on, say those who are familiar with talks, Snowe was the lone voice in Baucus' bipartisan "Gang of Six" negotiating group complaining that the federal subsidies...