Baucus reaction

So Baucus dropped his bill yesterday....to what we'll call a less than enthusiastic response. But hey, I'm sure Max Baucus liked Max Baucus' bill, even if Senators were diving out of their offices to tell anyone with a camera they weren't happy with it. We've had our reaction from the political hacks and loudmouthed, bitchy bloggers, but what of a substantive analysis of the bill? Is it actually any good? Sure Baucus locked out Democrats in order to waste time, make concessions that were unpopular, and end up with no Republican support, but did the bill at least use a nice font?

The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities decided to take a look at the bill and in it's overall analysis it called the bill "fiscally responsible" that contained "sound policies that would use resources in the health care system more efficiently." But, they also noted, reflected a common complaint of the day, the subsidies he provides for people to buy insurance are too small and would "leave many people who are eligible for subsidies facing fairly steep insurance premiums and cost-sharing charges that they could have difficulty affording."

When discussing the bill's "free rider" portion, where employers who do not offer health coverage are required to pay for low and moderate income employees receiving government subsidies, the CBPP note that this is going to not only discriminate against and discourage the hiring of the poor and especially the poor with children, but place barriers to employment, and raise the child poverty level. The Washington Post's Ezra Klein, who if not an outright cheerleader of the bill is at least more positive and upbeat about it than most, called the "free rider" provision "The Worst Policy in the Bill, and Possibly in the World" and, were he artistically able, would have drawn a picture of Max Baucus raping a peasant. Furthermore, Klein notes that the co-ops, the supposed solution to nasty socialist public plans, have been completely neutered from even their original construction as a completely neutered version of a public option and are thus practically useless.

On the cost of the bill and the supposed "budget neutrality" aspect of the bill and it's cheapness when compared to other bills, James Kwak notes that it does this by essentially forcing down $140 billion more in taxes on the middle class in what must be Baucus' bid to become deeply unpopular and make terrible political and policy moves. The New York Times Prescriptions blog is more blunt in it's assesment, noting that the bill is likely to please drug companies and insurers....and no one else. The Times also published an "experts blog" where experts from various fields all looked at the bill and decided it ranged from a "bad bill" to "a sinking ship". Positivity!

So give it all a read and decide just how angry to get and to what level you think you're getting screwed. You know what's sad? That even after Baucus decided that it was his duty to move American health care forward in the worst way possible, that despite all the complaints, bad ideas, industry toadying, time wasting, corporate handouts, and sodomizing of the American populace; his bill would actually move American health care forward. Isn't that depressing? When even terrible ideas are an improvement? Oh, and in case you were wondering: Baucus used the Verdana font.