House Speaker Nancy Pelosi hopes to see it “modified.” Wyoming Republican Sen. Mike Enzi says it “spends too much, and it does too little to cut health care costs.” West Virginia Democratic Sen. Jay Rockefeller claims that it follows a model that has “largely failed.”
Even the White House’s response to Montana Sen. Max Baucus’ long-awaited health care reform legislation was tepid, with Press Secretary Robert Gibbs calling it an “important building block,” but adding that, “I don’t think this a mirror of what the president has talked about.”
At some point, Baucus must wonder whether playing point man for the most divisive issue in American politics is worth all the trouble. Just last March, Time magazine referred to our senior senator as “Mr. Health Care,” describing the “zeal” with which he was working on overhauling the country’s health care system. But critics on Capitol Hill worked hard last week to sap up any initial enthusiasm for his legislation –that is at once too timid for the left and too drastic for the right.
Yet 24 hours into his beating, a beleaguered Baucus said, “I expect that when we finally vote on the health care reform bill in the Finance Committee in the next week there will probably be Republican support.” He is, at least outwardly, an eternal optimist among cynics who have little faith in his long effort that produced a policy mechanism called “co-ops,” which would do the following:
Nonprofit cooperatives would be created to establish a marketplace that, in theory, offer alternatives to insurance company plans. Small businesses, with 50 or fewer employees, could shop these marketplaces to purchase insurance for their employees, while larger businesses would be phased into the program over the next several years. All of these co-ops would be required to offer a minimum amount of coverage, but since this is not a public option, they would be unaffiliated with any government entity. The problem with this – and it’s a big one – is not everyone believes the program will succeed in providing affordable health care to those who need it.
There’s plenty more provisions in Baucus’ bill that have proved divisive, such as employer mandates (will they make businesses reluctant to hire low-income workers?); federal subsidies (are they too skimpy to pressure insurance companies to lower costs, or too high to sustain?); and increased Medicaid (will expanding eligibility to individuals at 133 percent of poverty level bankrupt states already strapped with tight budgets?).
Our senator was also criticized for the process in which he pieced together the 223-page document. His liberal colleagues charged that he had tried too hard to court Republicans at the expense of real reform. Ironically, those same Republicans accused Baucus of authoring a “partisan proposal.”
Baucus, who stood alone at the podium when introducing the bill that pundits once claimed could define his legacy after 30 years in the Senate, has maintained that a consensus could be reached before senators begin voting on the bill this week. And after an initial drumming, Baucus began receiving soft support.
First, four senators – Democrats Ben Nelson (Nebraska) and Claire McCaskill (Missouri), Republican Olympia Snowe (Maine) and Independent Joe Lieberman (Connecticut) – released a joint statement to “commend Chairman Baucus for his efforts to forge a health care reform proposal that has the potential to gain broad bipartisan report.”
And, while it means little to those who say the legislation won’t work, Baucus did succeed in proposing a relatively frugal health care plan, compared to other health care bills in Congress. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office in its preliminary analysis said it wouldn’t add to the country’s deficit, which is critical to garnering broad support.
It’s too early to tell whether Congress can reach a deal that will appeal to the majority in both chambers and, more importantly, the majority of Americans. But it’s also too early to call Baucus’ efforts a total failure.