Word: nelsoned
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...loan industry estimates that up to 35,000 jobs might be lost by the transfer from FFEL to direct-loan. Members of Congress who represent states that employ a large portion of the industry workforce, like moderate Democratic Senator Ben Nelson of Nebraska, have opposed the measure for that reason. But the Department of Education (which would run the new and expanded program) maintains that because Sallie Mae and several other companies would be kept on as contractors to "service" the loans - performing administrative tasks such as answering student inquiries and collecting payments - the total amount of jobs lost will...
...votes in the chamber. "I don't think the audience was in the chamber. I think the audience was in the viewing public out there, to help them understand and reset the message that health-care reform benefits everybody one way or another," said moderate Nebraska Democratic Senator Ben Nelson, standing by the Capitol in front of a bus about to take him and 16 other Democrats to the White House for a chat with the President on health care. "I'm not going to commit to anything until I see everything, because there are so many moving parts...
...Nelson and the other moderate Democratic Senators had an hour-long meeting in the White House Cabinet room. The group came to agreement on issues like making the bill deficit neutral and reducing debt in the long term while at the same time treading gingerly over the remaining issues to be negotiated, including the possible inclusion of a so-called public-insurance option. According to Obama aides, the President urged the Senators to continue reaching out to him over the coming weeks with suggestions and feedback. When the meeting concluded, the Senators returned by bus to the Capitol, leaving...
...fact, it's smaller meetings like the one Obama had with Nelson and his comrades that are most crucial for getting a bill passed. Obama admitted in a prespeech interview with ABC that he made the mistake of keeping a distance from Congress because he didn't want to "step on any toes." Shoring up moderate Dems is a beginning; he must also work to garner support across the aisle, where Maine's Olympia Snowe is currently considered the most likely convert. During the summer of discontent, the White House stopped reaching out to some key potential votes: the other...
...Meanwhile, in the Senate, where a compromise has not yet been reached, there are some signs that agreement time might be upon us. On Sept. 6, in an interview with CNN, Nebraska Democrat Ben Nelson, a longtime opponent of a public-health-insurance option, said he could support a public plan as a "fail-safe" or "backstop" that would be created only if insurance companies did not reform their business practices over the coming years. Republican Senator Olympia Snowe, a key swing vote from Maine, has also spoken favorably about a triggered fail-safe. (See TIME's health and medicine...