Stingy Baucus Bill Repels Senators, Relieves Special Interests
Obama holds health care rally in Maryland today. Balt. Sun: "...his latest appeal in what is quickly becoming the most extensive presidential selling job in years."
Salon.com: "The whole point of the exercise had been to get Republicans on board, and they walked away."
Sen. Rockefeller getting encouragement from other Dems for opposition to Baucus, he tells HuffPost: "A lot of them have come up to me and thanked me because I said what they're thinking. And because I sit next to Baucus and am senior, my saying it, I think, was good leverage and helpful and made it easier on people."
But it's centrist, so it must be good! W. Post: "...it appears that no one is happy with Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) -- and that may be the best news President Obama has had in months."
CBO gives Baucus a big wet kiss. TPMDC: "From 2010 through 2019, the legislation, if enacted as is, would reduce the federal deficit by $49 billion. And, in a rough projection, CBO found that the bill would continue to provide savings relative to current law, for the 10 years thereafter. Though there's a tremendous amount of uncertainty, from 2020 through 2029 the legislation would save on the order of .5 percent of GDP."
Ezra Klein notes what the CBO loves: "This good score is the product of the Finance Committee's sources of funding, not the relative stinginess of its subsidies."
Also note, CBO was unimpressed by co-ops: "The proposed co-ops had very little effect on the estimates of total enrollment in the exchanges or federal costs because, as they are described in the specifications, they seem unlikely to establish a significant market presence in many areas of the country..."
At least Baucus increased access to health insurance exchanges notes Swampland's Karen Tumulty.
CBPP also hit Baucus on stinginess, while deeming it better than the "status quo": "...the plan falls short in the subsidies it provides to help low- and moderate-income people afford health coverage and out-of-pocket costs ... And by requiring employers to pay extremely large amounts for hiring individuals who receive subsidies for family coverage in the exchange, the provision would make it harder for some lower-income parents with children to find jobs."
Insurance stocks rise on heels of Baucus announcement reports Wonk Room. Special interests relieved reports AP: "[The Baucus bill] gives health insurers, drug makers and large employers reasons to heave sighs of relief, sparing them the higher costs and more burdensome rules included in other Democratic-written alternatives."
Someone please tell the NY Times the whole point of the public option is to cut costs: "More liberal members like Senator John D. Rockefeller IV of West Virginia and Senator Bernard Sanders, independent of Vermont, have been strong advocates of a public insurance option; many of the more centrist Democrats have come down just as strongly against one. Centrists are interested in holding costs down; progressives want to bring more Americans under the insurance umbrella, a push that drives costs up."
RJ Eskow offers "Top Five Reasons the Baucus Bill Is Really, Really Bad": "Premium rules that are a giveaway to the insurance companies ... [Despite lack of affordability,] individual mandate is in there anyway ... It taxes benefits, slowly but surely ... No public plan option ... Co-ops can't always 'cooperate.'"
Do right-leaning Dems want to make the Baucus bill worse? CQ: "...pivotal centrists voiced concerns about the plan’s price tag..."
Climate Bill Still Alive
WH downplays delay talk. AFP: "The White House on Wednesday played down the possible impact of putting off major U.S. climate change legislation to 2010, vowing to press for progress on the issue ahead of global talks in December. Asked whether a delay would amount to a setback for President Barack Obama’s priorities on the issue, spokesman Robert Gibbs told reporters: 'No, I think we can continue to make progress.' 'We’ve got to make progress and the international community’s got to make progress getting China and India and developing nations, and evolving world economies like Brazil, on board,' he said."
Duke Energy CEO casts doubt on clean coal technology. Washington Independent's Kate Sheppard: "He argued that it’s unlikely that the United States will be able to develop and bring to scale carbon-capture-and-storage ... 'It’s more likely that China will develop and bring CCS to scale. ... We’re going to be buying their technology.' He also acknowledged that concerns about coal extraction methods like mountaintop removal may make coal more expensive in the near-term."
EFCA Deal Not Done
The Hill reports Specter's prediction of EFCA bill is not a certainty: "Democratic senators on Wednesday downplayed Sen. Arlen Specter’s (D-Pa.) prediction that the chamber would pass a contentious union-organizing bill this year, saying they are in the process of shoring up support for a compromise that is being hashed out. Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del.), one of several negotiators working to reach agreement on a modified version of the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA), also known as card-check, said they have made progress toward a deal but have yet to ink one. Several Democrats on Wednesday confessed to knowing nothing about a proposed deal, and the party’s top two leaders in the conference called the card-check proposal a work in progress."
HuffPost's Art Levine analyzes the election of Richard Trumka to head AFL-CIO: "The selection Wednesday of Richard Trumka as president of the AFL-CIO could add a harder progressive edge to the tough drives for health care and economic reform ... He's expressed a willingness to challenge centrist and conservative Democrats who abandon the progressive agenda of the union members who helped elect them, and a new determination to reach out to younger workers -- a third of whom under 35 now live with their parents -- as a way to strengthen both the union movement and the American middle class."
Student Loan Reform In Good Shape
W. Post predicts easy House vote today for ending subsidies to private student lenders: "The federal government would end its four-decade practice of subsidizing private lenders that make college loans under a bill the House took up Wednesday that would steer tens of billions of dollars in savings to student aid over the next decade ... Democrats, in the majority, predicted easy passage on a largely party-line vote Thursday for a bill that also promotes various education initiatives from preschool to college. Hurdles may emerge when the Democratic-led Senate takes up its version in the fall."
NYT's Gail Collins adds: "Just when you begin to think that these people are never going to be able to do anything, ever, here comes student loan reform, scampering down the aisle, wagging its hopeful tail. The bill actually got a couple of Republican votes in Miller’s committee, which is two more than Baucus has gotten on anything so far. When it gets to the Senate, the Democrats plan to do one of those reconciliation maneuvers that allow them to pass a bill with a mere majority of votes, radical as that might seem."
Breakfast Sides
David Broder frets that enforcing trade rules will spark trade war, while Bloomberg reports: "Chinese consumers who buy $608 billion of goods from overseas are diminishing the prospects of a trade war with the U.S."
Bill to open Fed to audits now has 290 House sponsors reports HuffPost.
