Posted on 10/13/2009 11:26:45 AM PDT by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine said Tuesday that she'd support a sweeping Senate Finance Committee bill overhauling the U.S. health-care industry, giving Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., a sought-after Republican vote on President Barack Obama's top domestic priority.
In highly anticipated comments on the $829 billion, 10-year bill, Snowe said the bill wasn't all she wanted.
"Far from it," she told fellow senators during what is likely to be the committee's last work session on Baucus's bill. "But when history calls, history calls, and I happen to think that the consequences of inaction dictate the urgency of Congress to demonstrate its capacity to solve the monumental issues of our time."
Baucus kicked off the committee meeting Tuesday morning, saying "now is the time to get this done," after the committee's longest bill-writing session in more than 22 years. The panel is expected to vote its final approval or rejection of the bill before the day's end.
The legislation needs 12 votes to clear the 23-member committee. If it passes, it would mark a major milestone on the road to overhauling the $2.4 trillion U.S. health-care industry. The Finance Committee's is the last of five congressional bills to be voted on. Both the Senate and House would need to pass bills for Obama to sign.
The committee's early debate reflected deep partisan divisions.
Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, said the bill grows government, puts in place the biggest expansion of Medicaid since the federal program's creation, and saddles individuals with mandates to buy insurance.
"I wish I felt better about the substance of the bill," said Grassley, the panel's top Republican.
Sen. Jim Bunning, R-Ky., was blunter. He said the measure "adds insult to injury" by hitting people with penalties if they don't buy health insurance.
(Excerpt) Read more at marketwatch.com ...
Damn that old crone. Damn her to hell!
Key Republican. Olympia Snowe is neither.
Have they voted yet? can we all call her office and tell her what we think?
I personally suspect that she’s a Democrat operative.
She is not a “Key Republican” in any sense of either word
We could if her phones were not constantly busy. I have called her Washington office about 15 to 20 times today and have not been able to get through. But I will keep trying.
Agree. “Key”..to what? Given what governmane health care has done to people in her own state you’d have figured she would have thought twice. Soomeone must have written a VERY large check to her.
But you also wonder if there will be any “Key” Democrats who defect?
Let me guess, it’s Snowshoe face? Right?
Isn’t it weird how the commies in the politburo don’t sign on for the same crap they force people to?
Isn’t it obvious how this works? we are having the same scam run in Florida - You take a commie RINO, in this case Crist, the media gets behind them, they win, and then they vote with the rest of the commies. Their prize, a seat in the WDC politburo.
Snowshoe face fits the formulaic to a T. Take her out in the primary.
Help Marco Rubio if you can.
The bill they take up on the Senate floor won’t be this bill anyway, so what does it matter. She can vote for this, and then filibuster the Reid bill because he takes out something she wanted.
of course, I’m not at all encouraged by her “this is a bad bill, but history calls and must be answered” argument.
This is why people voted for an idiot for President, simply because he was black.
This old bit*h is not a conservative. May she rot in hell.
Snowe said the bill wasn’t all she wanted.....”Far from it,” she told fellow senators during what is likely to be the committee’s last work session on Baucus’s bill. “But when history calls, history calls”
so she’s not getting what she wants but will vote for it because it’s historic????
sounds like 30 million voters from last November.....effin moron....
History calls? Her reasoning here is so illogical it hurts my brain.
People need to understand no one is bound by this unconstitutional legislation if it were to become law since Article 1 Section 8 of the Constitution doesn’t expressly grant Congress the power to regulate health care.
I would just like to again thank blue state Montana for the “gift” that is Max Baucus. I hope the subsidies to you ranchers is worth what he is doing to this country.
Don’t count on it.
WELL I GUESS THEY ARE GOING TO IGNORE US!
how can we get their attention? Without the phone?
I can’t, not if I want to stay out of prison.
Key? HAHAHAHA....
Only in the minds of leftists.
if she wants a front-row seat to history calling, just go ahead and pass this thing and see what happens
Isn’t there a way to make her a non-key republican?
i had to tun off the t.v. I CANT STAND GIBBY, He has gotten more and more full of himself...he thinks he is a comedian now....Could we just go right to 2012!!!
I’d rather a democrat had her seat.
It would make no difference in the way the seat voted,
and the left couldn’t use her as a “bi-partisan” foil.
What is she voting FOR? How can anyone vote on a bill that they have not read?
For all the good it does us, the perverts, liars and thieves would do us all a favor if they sent their pet dogs to do their job! The dogs wouldn’t even have to be alive to do a better job.
The RATs will now be able to call their socialist health care program a bipartisan bill. Thanks for stabbing us in the back Snowe. Not that you give a damn.
"RINO Twin powers activate!"
Of course the Republican party will do nothing to penalize her.
Filthy Manx. Someone take away her broom.
There.
“Read”?! What they’re voting on out of the committee has not even been written. There is no legislative language.
No doubt she is serving her voters. No doubt about that at all. They will be pleased. Nothing but a cesspool of communists in Maine as far as I can tell.
You have a point. Having said that, is there any way in hell anyone but a RINO or dim could unseat her?
The state-run media is trumpeting this as their greatest triumph of all time.
I no longer have any faith in our system of government; it has broken down completely. As for me working hard? Forget it; I’m going Galt. Whatever I gotta do to get by, and not one ounce of effort more. And I will hide my potatoes from the commissars, too.
Meet Senator Snowe's replacement:
(It's Rawdy, for those of you in Rio Linda.)
Just shove the potatoes up their tuchuses (sp?) when they come to collect.
Define “key”...
She’s not a “key Republican”, the only reason she pretends to be, is because she couldn’t get on the DemoPervert ticket)
What she *is*, is a slit nose, sleeps with the enemy, WHORE...Who just got PAID!
She’s not a key Republican.
“Could we just go right to 2012!!!”
I am soooooooo ready.
Call her Maine offices instead....often works. Plus, you can tell them you are one of her constituents, “but your on a worksite in another state”, if you don’t happen to live in Maine....
Thank God you aren’t wearing that pointy hat.
Now leave my dog alone!
dictate the urgency of Congress to demonstrate its capacity to solve the monumental issues of our time
Gibberish dosed with hubris - Snowe is expert at this sort of nonsense.
Nearly everything that Congress meddles in, it ruins.
WTF is wrong with her? The demise of our great country is near! I feel like I’m getting an industrial broomstick shoved right up my ass. It’s painful and there seems no hope of extraction! Damn our Congress! A plague on them all!
Snowe sells us out again.
Just remember to return it to Senator Snowe so she can get to her townhall meetings.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.