Yes, they’re worried about seniors with paddle boards — in a sense. As Speaker Pelosi right now meets with her caucus for the second time today and the third time this week as members try to come to consensus on a health care bill, here’s a story from this week’s dead tree edition on what [...]
The Congressional Budget Office moves too slowly for Chairman Max Baucus. When CBO Director Doug Elmendorf told the committee earlier this week that it would take his office several weeks to formally assess the cost of Baucus’s most recent version of his bill – modified over the weekend and released Tuesday – the chairman said [...]
For the most part, 13-10 vote tallies on the Senate Finance Committee’s heath reform bill this week will be strictly along party lines. There are 13 Democrats on the committee, including Chairman Max Baucus, and 10 Republicans. But a 13-10 divide this afternoon on an amendment from Democrat Bill Nelson indicated a different kind of [...]
David Broder has a very strange column today, praising a paper by the conservative scholar William Schambra in which the author criticizes Barack Obama for being interested in…policy.
Who is the new, interim Senator from Massachusetts? Dan Fletcher tells us here.
Wrapping up around 11 p.m., Day 2 of the Senate Finance Committee Markup of its health reform bill did not offer any surprise changes to the bill. On nearly every amendment that drew out partisan division or contentious debate, Democratic Chairman Max Baucus either won the vote along strict party lines or ruled the amendments [...]
Before the lunch break in the Senate Finance Committee’s markup on health reform legislation, members engaged in a long and ultra-wonky debate on Medicare Advantage. The debate was essentially about whether more than $100 billion in cuts to Medicare Advantage will lead to a reduction in benefits. At the risk of being unclear, the answer [...]
Can the executive branch be trusted to make its own determinations of when “state secrets” released in court could significantly harm national security? That is the issue that is being debated today among civil libertarians in the wake of the Justice Department’s announcement of a new state secrets policy.
