Word: bille
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...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...
...many of those businesspeople, Snowe says, health insurance has become a "luxury, because the costs are astronomical. They essentially get catastrophic coverage at best." During her last re-election campaign, in 2006, an angry storekeeper in the town of Holden shoved his bill from Blue Cross Blue Shield at Snowe and demanded, "What are you going to do about this?" (See pictures of Republican memorabilia...
...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...
...Standing Apart I caught up with Snowe in the chandeliered reception room adjacent to the Senate chamber as she was racing from the Finance Committee's first drafting session for its health-care bill to a vote on the Senate floor and then to a luncheon with her Republican colleagues. She sounded almost rueful as she discussed a political environment in which her brand of bipartisan dealmaking sets her apart. "I understand politics plays a role in this process, but it should not be to the exclusion of our foremost obligation to the American people, which is to govern...
...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 his bill would provide to help individuals buy insurance were far too skimpy. When Baucus made his bill public, her complaint was echoed by many Democrats. As a result, Baucus agreed to make the bill's tax credits for low- and middle-income Americans more generous...