Health Care

Baucus (and Obama) Warn GOP Attacks Bad for Bipartisanship

By Shailagh Murray, Washington Post

Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) said the intensifying attacks against health-care reform by Republicans and their grassroots allies are threatening to pollute his committee's ongoing effort to craft a bipartisan bill.

"It's hard, when you have people like John Boehner saying, 'You've got to shred the president's health care plan over August,' and you get these very shrill partisan statements from the other side," Baucus said, referring to comments last week by the House Minority Leader. "And you have to be a realist, too, in life and when you serve here."

Baucus said a bipartisan bill remains Obama's "predilection," but he said that at a White House lunch today with Democratic senators the president expressed concerns about whether the goal was attainable. A coalition of six Finance senators -- three from each party -- are seeking a deal that would produce the consensus version of health-care reform. Baucus has set a Sept. 15 deadline for the group to complete its work.

"There may come a time after some time later this year, we may have to make other decisions," Baucus said. He said Obama "wants results." "He's not going to just keep negotiating something that's not getting anywhere," Baucus said. "But that's a judgment call."

He added, "I think we're getting somewhere. I've got faith... we've all said we want to give him a bill he can sign by the end of the year, and that's our goal. This is only August."

But the chairman predicted: "I think this is going to turn the end of August, the end of September, when people start to understand, hey, yeah, maybe this is the right thing to do, after they've heard all the small band of shrill criticism against it. That's going to wear out over time and be met with the firm convictions of senators that this is what we're trying to do here. And I think that will start to take hold."

Posted at 5:52 PM ET on Aug 4, 2009