Posted: July 24, 2012 at 9:45 pm
Baucus Wants Corporate Money Out of Politics
I hate to kick a guy when he’s down, but not if he is asking for it. It is really absurd that Max Baucus has now jumped on the anti-Citizens United bandwagon.
A few days ago, a Montana democrat forwarded to me an e-mail from Max Baucus, railing against “big money in elections,” and describing the urgency with which America must “stand up against it.” Then I was played a robocall from Baucus, saying mostly the same thing and urging voters to unite behind him in his quest to “help fight the influence of big money in Montana” or something silly like that.
It’s unfathomable that Max Baucus would chose to join the fray on this issue, for he is just about the last person on earth that should be decrying the influence of corporate money in American elections. Baucus is one of the most prolific raisers of corporate money in the United States Senate, if not United States Senate history. He has raised, literally, millions of dollars from the many powerful industries that must kneel before him when they want something from the Senate Finance Committee, of which he is chair–Banks, Drug Companies, the Media Industry, and just about every multi-billion-dollar interest that wants special treatment under the law. And, Baucus’ office staff have frequently walked back and forth through the revolving door, writing legislation that affects large industries, leaving to become lobbyists or corporate honchos for those same industries, and then returning later to write some more legislation.
When sufficient votes in the US Senate existed for a national public insurance option, that would have competed against private insurers and broken the health insurance oligopoly in America, Max brought the hammer down on it, doing the bidding of his insurance industry supporters. And his adviser who drafted the compromise that would become the turd known as the Affordable Care Act, which provides 30 million new patients for doctors and hospitals and insurance companies but does nothing to bring down the cost of healthcare–is a health industry executive who was sent over to Baucus’ office to write the bill.
Max is not without his victories for the state of Montana, including a history of work to strengthen protection for public lands such as the Rocky Mountain Front. And while I can certainly understand how Baucus might feel left out of the fun, with Bullock and Schweitzer gobbling up column space and cable news appearances on the Citizens United issue, Baucus simply has no business complaining about corporate money in our political system. It is simply beyond the pale. It is an insult to all Montana progressives, and you deserve and apology for it.
Sorry I have to say it. But Max has been very good to this state. I know a lot of my Liberal friends cringe when I say this time and time again. But its my Opinion and too bad if no one else likes it!
I disagree. Mini Barfus pretty much singlehandidly destroyed the Dem party in Montana. He was bad news for Montana. He needs to go bye bye now. BTW, I don’t even consider him a Dem. He didn’t consider HIMSELF a Dem either. (couldn’t even put it on his campaign signs! wimp.) Mini is corpo the whole way.
while we disagree on this, i often find we do agree and i respect your opinion
well, the Bush tax cuts were a problem to me.
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 that did not included a provision to negotiate with drug companies for prescription in the plan, and instead allowed them to charge whatever they wanted.
And who could forget how in 2009, he slowed the progress of the health-care reform bill sought by President Obama as he pursued extensive negotiations with Republicans on the Finance Committee, which made the bill much more regressive and added the individual mandate–and removed the public option.
Many Democrats felt that the delay cost the effort crucial momentum, and opened the door to a summer recess filled with bitter attacks on “death panels” from which the bill’s popularity never recovered. In the end, only one Republican on the committee, Senator Olympia J. Snowe of Maine, voted for Baucus’s bill.
Yes I do remember when Baucus hitched his wagon to Bush Jr’s star back in the 02 election, when he was running against Mr. Crybaby. I remember I got ticked off at him back in 08 when he voted for the bailouts to AIG Bairsterns. That year I did not vote for him or go get a free hamburger. I voted for Bob Kelleher cause I thought it would be funny if he won. Plus I thought the man had been in every election since 1964 and deserved a victory. And yes his performance back in 09 on health care was dismal at best. But he is a product of voting lesser of two evils, and of being the only candiadate on the ballot. So this is what you get in our system.
Dear Max, Please let Jon Tester run this race. You are not up for election until 2 years from now. It’s not your turn, so please stop being a stone around his neck. We need Jon Tester to beat Rehberg, and you arent helping.
Well done, Cowgirl.
Hahahahha! Shorter Baucus “do as I say, not as I do.” he must think progressives are too stupid to know what he is up to.
Yes, it is absurd for one of the most corrupt members in the history of the senate to say he’s trying to get corporate money out of politics.
Until you look at what he’s actually trying to do. Since he’s wants to amend the Constitution, is he trying to fix it by clarifying that money does not equal speech or that corporations are not people? Of course not. He’s just saying that congress and states could — if they wanted — set caps on their elections.
Even if it passed, would this fix anything? No. Would it stop somebody from being as corrupt as Max Baucus? Of course not. Is it a transparent attempt to co-opt the real reform movement with fake reform? Yup. Should you be offended he thinks you’re so dumb you’ll fall for it? Indeed.
Luckily, we get to retire Baucus in 2014. Forty years is enough.
So Baucus is pretending to do something about the problem. Typical. Thanks for this information.
Gee, I guess this is a signal that Brian Schweitzer is in fact verrrrrrry interested in becoming a US Senator in the near future, Otherwise, why flog Max?
Jeebus, Skinner. Well the hell have you been?! We’ve been beatin’ on Mini for as long as I can remember.
Here Here MTCowgirl.
Finally someone in the party willing to point out this elephant in the room.
Key lesson: never do anything good if it takes attention away from Schweitzer, all your press are belong to BS.
I also remember the days when the Senate had 60 votes to pass the public option, Ted Kennedy had been miraculously cured of cancer, Al Franken had been sworn in before July and Ben Nelson, Blanche Lincoln, Joe Lieberman, etc… were not self immolating political cowards who lost their next elections despite their, “look at me, I’m so moderate,” pandering to Conservatives. Those were the days when Congress passed Cap and Trade and the Employee Free Choice Act and a Stimulus big enough to fill the $2 trillion output gap caused by the financial panic.
FYI Schweitzer is not up for election. Tester and Bullock are, and we need to focus on getting them elected, Baucus isn’t up until 2014.
The Public Option didn’t require 60 votes, only 51 (or even 50 plus Biden following through on Obama’s campaign pledge).
It was the most popular reform discussed. Instead Baucus passed a bill so bad that we lost Teddy’s seat, lost Pelosi’s gavel, and got wiped out in Montana legislative races, giving Montana the “bat crap crazy” session.
Unforgivable.
Thank you. One other point that’s got me angry. I got an invite in the mail for the Sieben Ranch Barbecue & Hoedown. Featured in the headline were Baucus, Tester, Bullock, and Gillan. I thought to myself, “Great, Sen. Baucus is raising money for Tester, Bullock, and Gillan. I’m there!” Then I read the fine print.
Quote:
“Contributions to Montana Victory 2012 will be allocated as Follows: Friend of Max Baucus 50%, Montana Democratic Party 50%”
So, none to Tester, Bullock or Gillan
It’s shameful that he’s skimming 50% during a critical election year.
Morally bankrupt.
I know that it may be hard to grasp but Max = More Money for other MT Democrats. The effect of having a powerful Senator in a small state is to “skim” political donations from the rest of the country’s high income centers to their state because powerful people want to get on their good side. You may want a Russ Feingold type but look at how that worked out for him and the more liberal state of Wisconsin. Do you think Jon Tester doubles up Rehberg’s fundraising without his ties to Max? What we need to focus on is using this advantage to build an infrastructure which creates more statewide support for liberal policies and allows/forces all of our elected representatives to support our policy preferences.
Mitt shook a great Blogger and sometime news commentor of politics said something quite close to this as well, regarding progressives on Obama It fits MAX as well. And your right Max has been bring home the bacon to get Montana democrats elected a long time. This basically fits any argument we have about health Care as well.
Milt Shook:
Let’s get something straight, professional left. Presidents lead the government, not the politics. If you want new rules and laws that make gun owners more responsible and place reasonable regulations on gun ownership, you need to make your case to THE PEOPLE. Blaming President Obama for not proposing stricter laws, as Michael Moore did tonight, shows a galling naivete regarding how politics works in this country. If President Obama was to propose a tough new set of laws, he’d be a lame duck. How likely would President Romney be to change the laws? And he’d lose precisely because we are not making our case to the public; we’re allowing the NRA to control the debate. If it takes an Aurora shooting to get us active, and our arguments are pure emotion, we lose. We cannot change policy based on emotional arguments, because emotion is fleeting.
Progressives have to learn politics. It’s getting embarrassing.
http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/07/despite_mitt_romneys_claims_aurora_shooters_gun_pu.php
http://2012.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/07/obama-calls-for-gun-control-after-colorado.php
http://crooksandliars.com/susie-madrak/mass-shooting-canada-compare-and-cont
The fact that Max = Money and Power, as you say, is exactly the point. That’s who he represents, those who have it. All you hear is how powerful he is, how that power is supposed to benefit us instead of those he’s giving special deals to in the Senate.
I want a Senator who = regular people who don’t have money. (like Jon Tester, woot!)
Sorry for the length.
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2010/11/how_joe_lieberman_helped_the_d.html
“But Lieberman killed it. It was never really clear why. He’d been invited to the meetings where the compromise was developed, but he’d skipped them.”
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2009/12/the_death_of_the_public_option.html
“That left Joe Lieberman. And Lieberman’s price for signing onto the bill was the destruction of the public option and, unexpectedly, the Medicare buy-in provision. There would be no triggers, no opt-outs, no compromises. Lieberman swung the axe and cut his deal cleanly, killing not only the public option, but anything that looked even remotely like it. ”
http://healthaffairs.org/blog/2009/10/19/baucus-the-public-option-is-alive/
“‘There are various versions of the public option being bandied about: the pure public option, then there’s Medicare light, even playing field … opt in, opt out. The long and the short of it is that this issue is alive — we’re looking at it,’ Baucus said. The Montana Democrat has previously said that there were not 60 Senate votes for a public option, but he softened that position somewhat on the call: ‘I just don’t know if there are 60 votes for the more pure kinds of public option; there may be more for the less pure kinds, but that’s up to the Senate.’”
Could Max have passed a bill with a public option out of his committee, yes. Would it have gotten 60 votes, no. Nelson, Pryor, Lincoln, Landreiu, Lieberman, and possibly Bayh would have voted against it. So to include a public option in the bill it would have required use of the budget reconciliation process. Insurance regulations and delivery system reforms and a whole host of provisions in the bill would have still needed to be passed with 60 votes, because they would not survive challenges from Republicans using the Byrd rule (which says that reconciliation can only be used for things that don’t “produce[s] changes in outlays or revenue which are merely incidental to the non-budgetary components of the provision”).
In the end Harry Reid and Obama decided not to initially pursue a reconciliation strategy, to use the normal committee process, and try to avoid the mistakes “Hillarycare” made. Harry Reid and Obama declined to include a public option or medicare for all in the eventual reconciliation bill as well. Did they do that because Max was dead set against those provisions, not at all.
Well written. In truth, Lamont’s campaign to unseat LIEberman was one of the only out-of-district races I have ever contributed to. And I sincerely wish more people had listened to (read) Ezra Klein before the disgusted reactions against the result of what appeared fairly inevitable. I don’t forgive Max his role in that process, but I don’t falsely attribute to him my own view of his evil intent, either.
Its called The price of Bipartisanship, it is too bad when we leftys start to act exactly like the conterparts on the other side of the Isle. Everything Max did could be improved, You dont get everything you want all the time. but the bill is passed as similarly bad as medicare and social security was… and your all whinning you didn’t get all the toys? Please!
Be glad for the first time in the last hundred years we have a way to start building a good Medical system!
There are some lessons we can learn from the other side. Our position is anti Citizens United. So should we complain that someone is not anti Citizens United enough, or that only some people should be getting attention for being anti Citizens United, or that someone has not been anti Citizens United in the past, no. Everyone on our side should be anti Citizens United at every turn. We should do nothing to undercut our side’s message that we are against special interests buying our elections. We should try to keep it in the news as much and as often as possible. We should present a united front so that the general voting public, who don’t have the time to pay close attention, understand that Democrats are always on the side of the middle class and Republicans are always on the side of rich special interests.
Yeah…pointing out that the supposed action he is taking doesn’t do anything is not the same as “criticizing someone for not being anti citizens united enough.”
That sounds like a matter of degrees. Essentially we’re arguing about what the best way to repeal Citizens United is. That argument is not productive from a public relations stand point. The exact language is here:
http://www.ktvq.com/news/senator-baucus-proposes-constitutional-amendment/
It looks like Max’s approach is, surprise, a narrow compromise measure that would still undo the negative effects of the Citizens United decision, and the recent ruling against our campaign finance laws. That seems to pass the bar of, “actually fixing this specific problem.”
So should we fight amongst ourselves over whether it doesn’t also fix a bunch of other problems? Problems that are going to be even more difficult to fix? That internal discord tells the average person, “Hey those guys aren’t really sure if this amendment is a good thing, I’m not going to support it.” Resulting in the horrible status quo becoming even further entrenched.
When an elected official does something bad call them on it but we can’t let, “the perfect be the enemy of the good.” There are dozens of billionaires aligned against us, our only power comes from uniting the people behind our cause. Do that. Do things to further our goals.
Max’s biggest offense by far was his vote to authorize the invasion of Iraq — he put his personal interests above those of the 4,500 American soldiers who died and the 33,000 who were wounded.
And if he actually believed the lies of the Bush Administration, he’s too stupid to be a U.S. Senator.
Neither he, nor Rehberg (who did the same thing) will ever receive my vote.
Mittisms, or how to tell if one is full of Mitt! Me, personally, I think we should just give Mitt and his wife, Ann-toinette, the crown! For you see, we the people DO already have enough! WHAT A CORONATION IT WILL BE! Dressage horses down Pennsylvania Ave! No mo Afro/psuedo American for US, baby! We’re BACK! The Anglos have arrived! FINALLY! We’ll be jus like the Brits! King Mittens the First! I can’t wait!
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/07/25/1113573/-Brits-mock-the-hell-out-of-Mittens-over-Anglo-Saxon-remarks-Do-shut-the-hell-up-like-a-good-chap
What a freakin’ dumbass! But HEY, if you’re goin’ for the Stockholm syndrome, might as well get some ROYALTY out of it, right?
Btw I just looked over at the “most read posts” list and saw that this one is listed right above the one where Baucus is supposedly calling for an end to corporate money in politics. Sigh. http://mtcowgirl.com/2012/07/24/baucus-wants-corporate-money-out-of-politics/
What politician has not accepted a lot of special interest money? If that were the criteria for reforming campaign spending, nothing would get done.
I applaud Max for getting the ball rolling. We need a constitutional amendment on the order of the one proposed by MoveToAmend, to prevent all non-person entities (including corporations, unions, non-profits, super PACs, etc.) from contributing money to support/oppose political candidates or ballot measures. It also would give local, State and Federal governments the constitutional authority to limit the amounts that individuals (including candidates) can contribute.