Party pooper - Just what kind of Democrat is Max Baucus, anyway?

by Brad Tyler for the Missoula Independent

Anyone who may have harbored doubts about U.S. Senator Max Baucus’ mental and physical toughness—and there are more than a few such in Montana these days—was more or less forced to amend those views by the end of Saturday, Nov. 22, 2003. That’s the day Baucus, a lifelong runner, ran the John F. Kennedy 50-mile road race in Maryland. Eight miles in, the 62-year-old veteran Democratic senator from Montana stumbled and fell and hit his head. Then he got back up and finished the final 42 miles of the race bleeding. Later, on Jan. 9, Baucus underwent successful brain surgery—relatively routine brain surgery, but still: brain surgery—to relieve pressure associated with a subdural hematoma thought to be a result of the fall.

<snip>

No one can doubt the man’s resolve. It’s his purpose people are beginning to question. Leftish elements of the Democratic Party were already wary of Baucus over his votes for Clinton’s NAFTA and the first round of Bush tax cuts. In his 2002 re-election campaign against Mike Taylor, Baucus further enraged state Democrats by appearing in his television ads mugging with George W. Bush at the signing of the tax bill. Then came Medicare.

<snip>

After the bill’s passage, liberal Wall Street Journal columnist Albert R. Hunt placed the blame for the “fraudulent bill” squarely at the feet of Baucus, who, Hunt wrote, “first with the fiscally reckless tax cuts two years ago, and now with a deeply flawed Medicare bill, has greatly facilitated the 2004 agenda for George W. Bush and Republicans.” Baucus did so, Hunt claimed, because he is “a case study in legislative weakness.” The evidence, Hunt wrote, is that Baucus bent to the Republican strong-arm tactic of disinviting party leader Sen. Tom Daschle of South Dakota to the negotiating table. “If Max Baucus had said that’s unacceptable,” Hunt wrote, “Republicans would have faced a choice of relenting or killing a politically popular measure. Incredibly, Sen. Baucus caved.”

<snip>

Senate Minority Leader Daschle, the magazine reported, “plans to impose more party discipline. Democrats who supported the Republican Medicare bill, for example, will not be given seats on the Senate Finance Committee, which writes health-care legislation, when the next vacancies occur.” It was a shot across the bow, a not very indirect threat to the senator from Montana, and it may have knocked him on his heels a bit. But the most direct confrontation, and the one that may have stung most, came when the state Democratic Central Committee of Lewis and Clark County, the county of Baucus’ birth, voted several weeks after the bill’s passage to censure Baucus—a purely symbolic gesture, but meaningful at a grassroot level—over his vote. The L&C Committee also invited other state committees to follow its lead; Baucus sent his state Chief of Staff Jim Foley around Montana on the breakfast-meeting circuit to defend the bill to disaffected party faithful and ornery seniors.

http://www.everyweek.com/News/News.asp?no=3924

We have to find a good candidate to challenge Baucus in the primaries in 2008!

He's a Montana Dem who really brings home the pork, that's what kind.

Yours truly,

Born in Montana, got the hell out of there as soon as I could.

every time I send a question or comment, I get a response, several weeks later, which may or may not have the slightest thing to do with the subject I was concerned about. Invariably, his response was much more in line with the malAdministration than with the principles historically associated with the Democratic party.

Used to have a bit of respect for the man, way back when I lived here before. Now, when I need to bend the ear of a senator, sadly, I get better consideration from McCain, even though I start each message with :'Though I am no longer an AZ resident...'

Yes, MT is pretty conservative, but it is a more traditional conservatism. The neocons have a noisy following here but it is a smaller one. Baucus is out of touch with the citizens and we need a new candidate.

He thinks he has to pander to the GOP members here abouts but the reason they were voting for him (even before the bad slide to the right) was his seniority and committee positions. We have a congressional delegation of only 3 and folks here know Baucus' seniority gives us a tiny bit of extra clout.

Hey, Max, get a clue. Racicot screwed MT over but good with his pro-CEO mindset. He got big bucks from the corporations he sold us out to then blew town and never looked back. We are pissed as hell and looking for leadership, not rubber stamps and corporate lapdogs.

He is the Zell Miller wing of the party which is to say he's a republican. I'll be glad to see both of them gone.

.

they are infuriating to no end. It justs galls me that I helped elect him.

Lieberman democrat.