John Cole finds Chuck Todd wanking away on Twitter.

Shorter Chuck Todd: It’s only big news if the Democrats fail!

I guess he didn’t pick up on the fact that if they had failed to get the 60 votes, HCR would, for all intents and purposes, be dead in the short run, as the Republicans would filibuster. That is why this is such a big deal- they have overcome the obstructionism of the GOP, and the debate can advance.

Although in fairness to Chuck, he may be more concerned with why Obama didn’t reach out more to President McCain. Not to be too subjective, or anything.

*** Update ***

Can anyone imagine the feeding frenzy for the next two weeks if they had failed to get 60 and advance the debate? Can you imagine the Sunday shows tomorrow? Can you imagine all the headlines speculating if Obama was a lame duck? “Senate fails to advance health care reform. Is Obama’s entire agenda at risk?” and “Obama’s signature legislation killed in Senate. Can he recover?” and “Republicans, spurred by sagging Obama poll numbers and grass roots support from tea party, stop Obama administration in their tracks.”

And Chuck Todd would be leading the goddamned charge with that crap.

Chuck Todd explains in Twitterific form what the Village really thinks. Does he not understand how the legislative process works? Nope. Does he remember that it was a Blue Dog Royal Senator named Max Baucus that helped pass Bush's tax cuts and medicare drug plan:

Some Democrats think Mr. Baucus betrayed the party in 2001 when he supported President George W. Bush's tax cuts, and in 2003 when he was one of two Democrats to help Republicans pass a Medicare prescription drug plan.

If George Bush had failed at getting these through, would Todd be questioning the conservative movement? Nope. They would be telling America that since they elected Bush, the Democrats were traitors to America. But when a Democrat is President all the Villagers look forward to is failure.

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George Will is either lying, or he doesn't have any idea how to use the Internet. During the panel discussion on This Week, Will says this about the Baucus bill that came out of the Senate Finance Committee.

Stephanopoulos: And if he does is that the last hurdle? Or are we in for more twists here before the end?

Will: I think there could be more twists and there are going to be a lot of amendments put on the floor. And they're going to have to decide whether or not they're going to allow amendments and to what extent they're going to allow extensive debate.

Stephanopoulos: Nancy Pelosi suggested this week that there might not be any amendments on the House floor.

Will: Of course not for the same reason--although they could put this on the internet in 10 minutes, they haven’t put it on the internet, this 1502 pages, because people might discover what’s in there.

As our reader and tipster Stephen noted today, the bill has been on line since Oct. 19th. Anyone can go read all 1504 pages here and here. I guess it's asking too much of George Stephanopoulos to have pointed that out to George Will.

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The Rock Obama returns to Saturday Night Live, this time in response to Max Baucus, Olympia Snowe and Mitch McConnell's lack of cooperation on some actual health care reform.

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From Bill Moyers Journal:

BILL MOYERS: You know from the news that early next week the Senate Finance Committee is expected to vote on its version of health care reform. And therein lies another story of money and politics.

Polls show the overwhelming majority of Americans favor a non-profit alternative -- like Medicare -- that would give the private health insurance industry some competition. But if so many Americans and the President himself want that public option, how come we're not getting one?

Because, the medicine has been poisoned from day one, in part because of that same revolving door that Congresswoman Kaptur and Simon Johnson were just talking about. Movers and shakers rotate between government and the lucrative private sector at a speed so dizzying they forget who they're working for.

SEN. MAX BAUCUS: Our plan does not include a public option.

BILL MOYERS: Take a close look at that woman sitting behind Montana Senator Max Baucus. He's the Democrat who's the Chairman of the Finance Committee. Liz Fowler is her name. And now get this. She used to work for WellPoint, the largest health insurer in the country. She was Vice President of Public Policy. And now she's working for the very committee with the most power to give her old company and the entire industry exactly what they want: higher profits, and no competition from alternative non-profit coverage that could lower costs and premiums.

I'm not making this up. Here's another little eye-opener. The woman who was Baucus' top health advisor before he hired Liz Fowler? Her name is Michelle Easton. Why did she leave the Committee? To go to work -- where else? -- at a firm representing the same company Liz Fowler worked for WellPoint. As a lobbyist.

It's the old Washington shell game. Lobbyist out, lobbyist in. And it's why they always win.

Continue reading »

(from WMXdesign h/t Howie Klein)

If your unemployment ran out this week, you can thank Sen. Jon Kyl. Yes, the Republican whip objected to a quick vote that would have helped all those people. You can contact him here and thank him for his compassion:

Washington -- Key Senate Democrats tried unsuccessfully today to quickly pass legislation to give jobless workers in Michigan and other hard-hit states an additional 20 weeks of unemployment benefits.

That delays action on the high-stakes issue until at least next week.

Tom Clementson, a 58-year-old unemployed construction worker in Indian River, expressed frustration by the Senate's slow pace.

"So many people are out of work and need this extra money to put food on the table," said Clementson, who cashed his last check six weeks ago. "It seems like the Senate should spend more time on getting this passed."

Today's failed effort to quickly pass a bill followed the unveiling of a compromise bill by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada and key allies. The bill would give all states an extra 14 weeks of jobless benefits, plus an extra six weeks for states with unemployment rates of 8.5 percent or greater.

[...] Reid introduced the bill after reaching a deal with Sen. Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, who had balked at the House-passed bill, which only gives extra benefits to the hardest-hit states.

[...] But when Reid asked senators to quickly pass the bill under a speedy procedure, Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., objected. That's enough to prevent a quick vote.

Kyl said he wanted to have time to look at the proposal and consider possible Republican amendments, and also ask the independent Congressional Budget Office to estimate its cost.

[...] While objecting to quick passage, Kyl said he expects "at the appropriate time," Republicans will "be able to work out some kind of agreement."

Kyl helped cause this mess. It's only good manners to help clean it up - but then, Republicans aren't big on personal responsibility, are they?

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Ed Schultz talks to Rep. Anthony Weiner about the hesitation from the White House to call out the Conserva-Dems on supporting some real health care reform.

Congressman Weiner encouraged everyone to go to his new web site at Countdown to Health Care and let John Boehner know what he's wrong about support for the public option.

From The Colbert Report:

Senator Max Baucus will pay for your medical bills from the $3.2 million he's received from the health care industry.

From The Colbert Report:

Republicans and Democrats should march in pride parades and proudly announce their relationship with lobbyists.

(Note: I am a blogger fellow with Brave New Films and their Sick For Profit campaign. Visit us on Facebook)

It's important to understand what a bill without that public option would actually do. Brave New Films got Jerry Flanagan of Consumer Watchdog to explain the elements of Baucus-care without a public option, and it's not a pretty picture.

As Flanagan explains, without a public option, insurance companies can set their own rates, set their own level of benefits, and force the uninsured to pay them under penalty of law - you're talking about a forced market where people will be fined for not giving money to private health insurance companies. Max Baucus would say that there are safeguards to limit the amount of out-of-pocket spending or premium spending as a percentage of income, but he wants those rules to be set by the National Association of Insurance Commissioners, an industry-friendly group without open meetings or public hearings, making the potential for loopholes and abuse very ripe.

Flanagan also takes on the bad employer provisions in the Baucus bill, which will allow them to drop health care for their customers and throw them onto the exchanges. He says that employers could pay only a couple hundred dollars a year per employee under this plan.

Flanagan further explains that the co-op alternative in the Baucus bill could lead to the gutting of state consumer protection laws on health insurance. This is a key point, and could lead to the insurance market looking like the credit card market, with every issuer moving to states with virtually no regulations or restrictions on how they manage their credit card business.

If you're looking for a quick, succinct way to explain the problems with the Baucus bill, pass along this video.

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Howard Dean is right as usual. Dr. Nancy points out the New York Times/CBS poll which says that 65% of Americans are in favor of a public option and asks Dean where the disconnect is. Dean points out the obvious-- the money going into the campaign coffers of elected officials that they're paying more attention to than their constituents.

I agree with Howard Dean. If the Democrats pass a bill without a public option, there is going to be a huge backlash against the party. I know Howard must feel like a broken record at this point, but I'm glad he's still out there pushing for the Democrats to do the right thing.

The Bobblespeak Translations: What Obama really said yesterday on Meet the Press. Later in that hour, David Gregory actually did his job...for once

Prairie Weather: The most important health-care document released this week was not Sen. Max Baucus's Healthy Future Act. It was the Kaiser Family Foundation's 2009 Employer Benefits Survey.

Calculated Risk: Senator Dodd pushing new bank regulatory plan

skippy the bush kangaroo: Environmental news

The Washington Note: Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu might be Obama's Khrushchev

Rising Hegemon: Conservatives and Porn

This should not be going on in a country with this much wealth. It's just shameful. From Democracy Now--As Baucus Unveils Health Plan Absent of Public Option, New Study Finds 45,000 Uninsured Die Every Year.

A long-awaited healthcare bill from Senate Finance Committee Chair Max Baucus includes no public option and would require almost all Americans to buy insurance or pay a penalty. This comes as a new study finds that nearly 45,000 Americans die every year due to lack of health insurance. We speak with the study’s co-author, Dr. Steffie Woolhandler, a professor of medicine at Harvard University, primary care physician, and co-founder of Physicians for a National Health Program.

JUAN GONZALEZ: Nearly 45,000 Americans die every year—that’s 122 deaths a day—due to lack of health insurance. That’s the startling finding of a new study that appears in the current issue of the American Journal of Public Health.

The figure is about two-and-a-half times higher than an estimate from the Institute of Medicine in 2002. The Harvard-based researchers found that uninsured, working-age Americans have a 40 percent higher risk of death than their privately insured counterparts, up from a 25 percent excess death rate found in 1993. Deaths associated with lack of health insurance now exceed those caused by many common killers such as kidney disease.

News of the study comes as the drive for healthcare reform is entering a new phase on Capitol Hill. On Wednesday, Montana Senator Max Baucus, the chair of the Senate Finance Committee, released his long-awaited healthcare reform proposal. The Finance Committee is the last of five congressional panels to produce legislation.

AMY GOODMAN: Despite months of talks to find a bipartisan compromise, Baucus’s plan had no Republican co-sponsors. The $856 billion proposal would require almost all Americans to buy insurance or pay a penalty and drops a mandate that all employers offer health coverage. The bill does not include a government-backed public option to compete with private insurers, instead proposes funds to set up nonprofit cooperatives.

For more on the proposal, we’re joined by Dr. Steffie Woolhandler, professor of medicine at Harvard University, primary care physician in Cambridge, also co-director of the Harvard Medical School General Internal Medicine Fellowship program. She’s co-founder of Physicians for a National Health Program and co-authored the American Journal of Public Health study called “Health Insurance and Mortality in US Adults,” joining us from Watertown, Massachusetts.

Professor Woolhandler, Dr. Woolhandler, thanks so much for being with us. Assess Baucus’s plan.

Continue reading »

Yep, the Baucus bill amendments are in. If you want to take a look, here they are:

The Friday 5 p.m. deadline has passed for filing amendments to the health care legislation in the Senate Finance Committee, and aides to Senator Max Baucus have finished tallying them: 543 in all, from both Democrats and Republicans.

Senator John D. Rockefeller IV of West Virginia will propose the creation of a government-run insurance plan. So will Senator Charles E. Schumer of New York, but with careful rules to make sure that the public plan competes with private insurers on a level playing field.

Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon will propose a requirement that employers offer at least two different choices of health insurance, or provide vouchers that would let their workers shop for alternatives in a new, government-regulated insurance marketplace. Mr. Wyden has another amendment that would expand eligibility for subsidies to help people buy insurance, by raising the income cutoff to 400 percent of poverty from 300 percent of poverty, which for a family of four would be $88,200, instead of $66,150.

Senator Maria Cantwell of Washington will propose increasing the income cutoff for Medicaid to 200 percent of poverty, or $44,100 for a family of four. And Ms. Cantwell also has an amendment that would revamp Medicare payments to doctors, hospitals and other providers to reward high-quality, lower-cost care.

Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey will push to lower a cap on the amount moderate-income families will have to pay in health insurance premiums to 10 percent of income, down from 13 percent. Senator Debbie Stabenow wants to push the cap even lower, to 6.5 percent of income.

Aides in the office of Senator Max Baucus, Democrat of Montana and chairman of the Finance Committee, are still trying to tally up all the amendments ahead of next week’s committee mark-up.

Zaius Nation: Zaius sings a time-honored tribute to Max Baucus.

Sunshine Empire: It's about payback.

Just an Earthbound Misfit: No, our children is not learning.

Fried Green Al-Qaedas: Horton Catches the Flu

And finally, Max Baucus, if that song by Zaius touched a nerve, you might take a lesson from Dirk Benedict.

Mike returns tomorrow; send tips to finnsagain AT aol DOT com

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President Barack Obama asked University of Maryland students to help him pass health care reform at a rally Thursday. Boos could be heard as the president mentioned a bill from the Senate Finance Committee chaired by Sen. Max Baucus.

"POTUS mentions Baucus bill -- it gets booed," wrote ABC's Jake Tapper.