Max Baucus is an Excellent Employee - of the Health Care Industry!

by Pa Rock
Political Observer

Stocks took a big tumble yesterday, with each of the major indexes losing over 2 percent of their value. (I don't consider myself a member of the investor class, but I like to check the numbers every day and track my small 401-K. The value of my 401-K dropped 60 percent during Bush's last year in office - and this year it has regained a big chunk of that. Thank you, President Obama!)

But yesterday stocks tumbled - they have a bad day every so often. There were, however, a few stocks that did quite well while the others tossed about. Health care companies and insurance companies had a very good day. Why? Because word went out that public option health care was dead and those industries would be free to keep robbing Americans of their financial security.

Democrats sent out signals over the weekend that they were going to jettison the controversial plan that would allow those without insurance to be able purchase it at an affordable price. Can't have the poor getting a break - not in this life!

That was then, but now they are regrouping and changing their tune. The AFL-CIO, good people all, are saying they won't support candidates who won't support a public option. Howard Dean, a highly decent and caring individual - and a medical doctor - said that any Congressman who votes against the public option will have a primary challenger.

Taking union money away from jellyfish and making them spend their precious remaining resources on primary races are both good ideas, but one more thing needs to happen. Max Baucus needs to lose his chairmanship of the Senate Finance Committee. Senator Baucus has been playing at reaching a "bipartisan" deal with Republicans for weeks, and keeping the details of his negotiations secret from members of his own party. That might be an effective approach to reaching a workable compromise, if that was what the Montana senator was really after.

Unfortunately for America in general, and uninsured Americans in particular, reaching a good compromise is not the senator's objective. Baucus is carefully killing the public option at the behest of his employers: the American health care and insurance industries. According to Roll Call magazine, Senator Baucus has received the following donations over the past four years:

$86,200 from pharmaceutical company Schering-Plough Corp, $65,250 from Amgen Biotech, $62,350 from Blue Cross - Blue Shield (now you know why your rates are so outrageous!), $59,150 from New York Life, $51, 750 from American International Group (Insurance and Financial Services), $51,250 from Aetna Health Insurance, and $47,850 from DaVita Health Care.

Baucus was also at the troughs of big banking and alcohol and tobacco interests.

Molly Ivins said it best, "You've got to dance with them what brung you." Sadly, the public did not bring Max Baucus to the dance - the health care industry did. Baucus is taking care of his own health and welfare, but his personal interests do not overlap with those of most Americans.

Max Baucus needs to lose the Finance Committee gavel, and if that makes him mad and he takes his bribes and goes home - well, that's just gravy!

Reddest of the Red, Bluest of the Blue

by Pa Rock
Citizen Journalist

Howard Dean, the out-going Chairman of the Democratic National Committee, came to his position four years ago with a desire to get away from the national slugfest over just two states, Florida and Ohio. Dean envisioned a fifty-state strategy in which the Democratic Party would be politically aggressive in every state of the union. Though many in both of the major national parties blithely smirked at Dean’s naiveté, he proved to be right on the mark. Dr. Dean realized that the voting population is getting younger and they are better educated - two demographics just aching to be courted by the Democrats.

Barack Obama also recognized the value of a national campaign. His smart Internet organization gave him an enormous money edge that allowed him to expand his campaign into states that have been traditionally Republican. This aggressive posture in Red states forced the McCain campaign to spend money and energy in states that they could have ignored in more ordinary circumstances.

The fifty-state strategy was effective. Team Obama won in places where Kerry and even Clinton had not been successful. Virginia turned blue for the first time in forty years. North Carolina also surprised many by finding its way into the Democratic column. Florida and Ohio, the two states that had placed and kept George Bush in the White House, went to Obama, as did normally Republican Nevada, Colorado, and New Mexico. Obama even took one electoral vote from Republican Nebraska.

By and large, the United States is much more purple today than it is blue or red, lending credence to President-elect Obama’s sage observation that “we are not a red America or a blue America, but the United States of America.”

There are, however, still some parts of the country that are resistant to turning purple. The presidential election results of 2008 would indicate that Hawaii (the birthplace of Obama) and much of New England are unabashedly blue. In fact, Obama won all of the counties in Hawaii, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Connecticut, and Vermont, with little Vermont giving him his highest percentage of votes of any of the states – a whopping sixty-eight percent!

And which state was the reddest of the red? Oklahoma won that title hands-down! Oklahoma was the only state in the Union in which McCain won every county. (Even the Mormon bastions of Utah and Idaho gave up some counties to Obama!) Oklahoma also gave McCain his largest statewide win with sixty-six percent of the votes.

Those liberals seeking communities rich in kindred spirits might do well to consider relocating (if they are not already there) to Hawaii or the northeastern United States. And if your thing is gun ownership, controlling what other people do in the privacy of their own bedrooms, and Christian zealotry, Oklahoma might just be your ideal comfort zone.

The rest of us may just have to hold our tongues as we slowly turn purple!