tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926413038778731189.post556364596275522429..comments2023-10-16T07:13:12.123-05:00Comments on A plain blog about politics: Senate CommitteesJonathan Bernsteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15931039630306253241noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926413038778731189.post-47139796480568887462009-09-05T16:24:11.476-05:002009-09-05T16:24:11.476-05:00Thanks for your comment!
If the committee was the...Thanks for your comment!<br /><br />If the committee was the same but with a liberal chair? Baucus certainly could paralyze the process in exactly the same way he's doing it now. The Democrats have a 13-10 majority in Senate Finance. Only Snowe is open to voting with the Democrats, and Baucus is one of four Dems (with Conrad, Lincoln, and Bill Nelson) who are all reluctant to vote for a bill perceived as too liberal. Those four are going to negotiate a deal (just as the Blue Dogs did in the House committee). If Baucus wasn't chair, then it might be Conrad, or Lincoln, or Nelson who took the lead, but the substance of negotiation would be the same.<br /><br />If the committee was packed with liberals (why is the ratio only 13-10, anyway?), then the bill would go through the committee easily...and then the same negotiations would take place before the bill reached the floor. <br /><br />It isn't the committee structure that drives the negotiations; it's that there are about fifteen Democrats who don't want to be perceived as voting for a liberal bill -- even if they do want a bill to pass, which I suspect most or all of them do. I'm not at all convinced that liberals would be better off if Pryor or Bayh or Bill Nelson was leading the negotiations instead of Baucus.Jonathan Bernsteinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15931039630306253241noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926413038778731189.post-20389993519232373952009-09-05T00:56:11.691-05:002009-09-05T00:56:11.691-05:00The only thing that committee structure suggests -...<i>The only thing that committee structure suggests -- it doesn't dictate, but it suggests -- is who gets first crack at leading the negotiations.</i><br /><br />That suggestion seems to be significant enough to give Matt and I our point. If Max Baucus were just an ordinary committee member and not a chair, he couldn't paralyze the process with this Gang of Six nonsense.Neil Sinhababuhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03249327186653397250noreply@blogger.com