Baucus: 'Disappointed' Obama budget has chained CPI

[LeftInTX]

Baucus: 'Disappointed' Obama budget has chained CPI
By Bernie Becker - 04/11/13 02:55 PM

A key Senate Democrat said Thursday that he was “disappointed” that President Obama’s latest budget included entitlement cuts.

Finance Chairman Max Baucus said the White House was wrong to call for changes to how inflation is calculated for payments to Social Security and military retirees — known as chained consumer price index (CPI) — without asking the highest earners to contribute more to the Social Security trust fund.

“Any reform of Social Security should be for the solvency of the program, not deficit reduction,” Baucus said at a hearing to discuss the fiscal 2014 budget with Treasury Secretary Jack Lew.

Obama’s inclusion of chained CPI in the budget has taken fire from both Democrats and Republicans in recent days. Rep. Greg Walden (R-Ore.), the chairman of the House GOP’s campaign arm, said the administration, which also asked for some changes to Medicare, had unleashed a “shocking attack on seniors” with his budget.

Baucus, whose panel oversees Medicare and Social Security, joins some of the most liberal Democrats in Congress in criticizing the White House budget for including chained CPI. The Finance Committee chairman is also seeking a seventh term next year in a state that overwhelmingly voted for Mitt Romney in the 2012 presidential election.

http://thehill.com/blogs/on-the-money/budget/293381-baucus-disappointed-obama-budget-has-chained-cpi

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Isn't Baucus one of the most conservative Democrats in the senate?

[tokenlib]

1. Max BAUCUS said that?? I'm speechless..

on edit I take back the surprise...I forgot how popular Obama is in Montana..

[madokie]

2. Yup he's disappointed because the president stopped him dead in his tracks

baucus is not our friend as he so aptly showed us previously. Now that the O man included this the pukes and many of the dems won't touch it with a ten foot pole. Brilliant play mr President.
I love my smarter than the average bear president.

[HiPointDem]

3. wtf are you smoking? republican majority in congress, jeb in the white house, here we come.

[madokie]

4. really now

[HiPointDem]

5. yes. really.

[madokie]

6. Have fun

I hope this doesn't give you a heart attack.
I leave you now as I'll hear no more of it
peace

[HiPointDem]

8. you guys got nuthin

[backscatter712]

11. Governance by reverse psychology!

The teabagger wing of the GOP's dumb enough that this actually works!

[madokie]

12. Of course they are

And yes its working

[green for victory]

7. was he "Disappointed" about having single payer doctors and nurses arrested at a hearing? no

Thanks Max!

[HiPointDem]

10. doesn't matter. the pubs can now pose as defenders of social security thanks to the big fat

gift from obama.

then when they own congress, the presidency and the supreme court they can do whatever the hell they want.

why would this admin give them such a gift?

[madokie]

13. that only plays out to the tea baggers

the rest of us can see what the hell is happening and why its happening.
We'll keep the Senate and pick up enough seats to take the house in '14.

[HiPointDem]

16. no. it plays to republicans generally and it plays to democrats as well, because most ordinary

democrats don't understand 3-dimensional chess and most ordinary democrats don't understand why a democratic president would put cuts to social security on the table.

Chained CPI Loathed By Seniors: AARP Poll

Sixty-nine percent of voters said they opposed or strongly opposed the chained CPI, according to AARP, while 16 percent said they supported it. Sixty-five percent said they'd have a less favorable opinion of their member of Congress if he or she supported the policy.

Previous polls have found similar opposition to chained CPI, including a HuffPost/YouGov survey from December that found 54 percent of voters disliked the idea, while only 16 percent liked it.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/05/chained-cpi-seniors_n_3021606.html

http://www.aarp.org/work/social-security/info-03-2013/social-security-cola-chained-cpi.html

[madamesilverspurs]

9. baucus

is one of those whose "democrat" designation comes with quotation marks. With good reason. If memory serves, Baucus killed the public option. I remember calling his office, the one at home instead of the one in DC, in order to let his staff know how well his crap wasn't playing. I wasn't the only one making those calls, and I kinda felt for the staffers; by the end of the second day they seemed almost in tears as they answered the phone. So, no, Baucus doesn't get to bitch about anyone else's Democratic bona fides.

[green for victory]

14. something to refresh your memory

Baucus had Single Payer Doctor and Nurse advocates ****arrested**** at a hearing.

again: Max Baucus had Single Payer Doctor and Nurse Advocates ****arrested**** at a HEARING.

Can you imagine the outrage if a Republican did that? Do you think people on this board would still be talking about it?

Baucus’s Raucous Caucus: Doctors, Nurses and Activists Arrested Again for Protesting Exclusion of Single-Payer Advocates at Senate Hearing on Healthcare

Advocates of single-payer universal healthcare — the system favored by most Americans — continue to protest their exclusion from discussions on healthcare reform. On Tuesday, five doctors, nurses and single-payer advocates were arrested at a Senate Finance Committee hearing, bringing the total number of arrests in less than a week to thirteen. We speak with two of those arrested: Single Payer Action founder Russell Mokhiber and Dr. Margaret Flowers of Physicians for a National Health Program.

Transcript--at link:
http://www.democracynow.org/2009/5/13/baucus_raucus_caucus_doctors_nurses_and

Watch Max go to work @ about 3:00

Is it any wonder that most Democrats forget this little episode? After all, now that the Democrats are the party of arresting single payer advocates, mandatory insurance, drone strikes, and cutting social security, It would be prudent to pretend bozo's like Baucus don't even exist.

[sendero]

15. Baucus.

.... unlike Obama, knows where the third rail is located and is not about to touch it.

[forestpath]

17. "Disappointed" is just another weasel word. I will never trust him.