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As recently as this past April, Max Baucus backed a strong public option — or so he claimed (h/t Steve Benen):
At that point, he and Ted Kennedy co-signed a letter to the president, explaining that they’ve been "working together toward the shared goal of significant reforms to our health care system" for nearly a year, and they planned to "swift" action. Indeed, they saw smooth sailing ahead: "Our intention is for that legislation to be very similar, and to reflect a shared approach to reform, so that the measures that our two committees report can be quickly merged into a single bill for consideration on the Senate floor."
So what happened between April and June, when suddenly Baucus came out as a foe of both the public option and of swift action on health care reform?
Emptywheel figures the change may have been related to the arrival on the scene of health-industry lobbyists bearing bags of money and influence:
On May 11, "stakeholders" including the AMA, PhRMA, the hospitals and the device manufacturers delivered proposals to the White House promising to "voluntarily" reduce cost increases over the next 10 years. In an effort to keep them "at the table," Baucus’s Chief of Staff Jon Selib and Finance Committee staffer Russell Sullivan told stakeholders at a May 20 meeting that their participation in the process of crafting a health care bill was contingent on them "holding their fire":
Sources familiar with the lobbyist meeting described it as collegial, but they said Baucus’ aides made clear that any public opposition to the proposed financing of a reform package would be at their clients’ peril. The staffers’ message to K Street was clear: Tell your clients to let the process work and don’t torpedo it with advertisements, press releases and Web sites.
Of course, in the case of Baucus, the health-industry lobbyists have been around for some time: He is the biggest recipient of their dough on all of Capitol Hill. Nearly one of every four dollars that’s gone into his coffers has come from that industry.
This is one reason why mere words of "support" don’t mean an awful lot when it comes to the public option. Unless those words are backed by hardcore action — such as a pledge to vote against any bill without a public option — then they aren’t worth very much.
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Even if there was such a deal and it were defensible, the health insurance companies violated it when they backed the death panel screaming teabaggers at the August townhall meetings. Just because they tried to hide it doesn’t mean they didn’t do it. This is just ridiculous! You don’t make deals with snakes and if you’re stupid enough to do it, you don’t let them get away with thinking they can sneak up and bite you and you’ll still go through with your end of the deal.
Now, hold on one gosh darn minute. Correlation is not causation.
Next thing, you’ll be telling us that all that CO2 has somehow caused global warming.
He says he wants to vote for the plan with the votes to pass the Senate. And then makes clear that he’s one of those votes standing in the way of a public option.
I just called my Senator (sigh) Baucus’ office and asked why he voted against public option amendments given his earlier statements in support. I was told that Max wanted to get a filibuster proof bill through and then would vote for a public option amendment on the floor.
So then I asked, since there is no Republican support for his bill anyway, and since the Dems have 60 Senators, who, exactly is he trying to persuade? No answer. So I asked, since the Dems have 60 senators, which Dem has stated that he will join a Republican filibuster? He hadn’t heard of any. I asked if Max would commit to not joining a GOP filibuster, and got no real answer.
So, then I just said that it appears to me that Max’s “bipartisan” charade had been exposed and he was just working for his true masters. No matter what else you say about Max, once he’s bought, he stays bought.