GOP: Creating a New Health Entitlement in 2003 Has Nothing to Do With Creating a New Health Entitlement in 2010

The Republicans blasting the Democrats’ health reform proposal as an unaffordable new entitlement are continually running smack into the tiny inconvenience that, just seven years ago, GOP leaders enacted the Medicare prescription drug benefit — a new federal program projected to cost taxpayers $550 billion dollars through 2016 alone. And More…

Grassley: Odds of Passing Health Reform ‘Not Very Good’ Without Starting Anew

With health care reform on the back burner following Republican Scott Brown’s Senate win in Massachusetts last month, more and more Republicans are predicting that that’s where it will remain unless Democrats agree to scrap the existing bill in favor of something bipartisan. Sen. Charles Grassley (Iowa), senior More…

Why Not Write a Jobs Bill That Would Create Jobs?

That’s the question being asked around the country today in response to the $85 billion proposal presented Thursday by Sens. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) and Charles Grassley (R-Iowa), the leaders of the Finance Committee. Although immediately rejected by Democratic leadership, the draft bill provides a sense of what conservatives More…

Bipartisan Senate Jobs Bill Reiterates 3-Month Jobless Benefits Extension

The latest draft — but perhaps not the final version — of a Senate jobs bill was released this morning by Sens. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) and Charles Grassley (R-Iowa), the leaders of the Finance Committee, who are hoping to tackle the nation’s 9.7 percent unemployment rate.

Wish them luck.

Dems’ Bill Would Extend Federal Medicaid Help for Six Months

On Monday, President Obama (via his budget proposal) put out the request for six additional months of extra federal Medicaid funding to help strapped states weather the economic downturn. Today, Senate Democrats complied.

Sens. Harry Reid (D-Nev.), the majority leader, and Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.), chairman of a key health More…

Grassley: No on Bernanke

Sen. Charles Grassley (Iowa), senior Republican on the Finance Committee, told reporters today that he will oppose Ben Bernanke’s bid for a second term atop the Federal Reserve, citing “concerns about inflation and the pattern of resistance to accountability.”

We need a chairman focused on a strong dollar and low

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More Questions for Pay Czar Over AIG Severance

Earlier in the month, Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) had some questions for the administration about just how it happened that a top AIG lawyer was given millions of dollars in severance after she quit the bailed-out company in lieu of accepting a pay cut.

Yesterday, Grassley was at More…

Grassley Questions ‘Severance’ Pay to AIG Exec

As Wall Street prepares to dole out billions of dollars in 2009 bonuses, Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) has his eyes on one particular payment of $2.8 million. That’s the amount reportedly paid to Anastasia Kelly, AIG’s general council, who resigned abruptly on Dec. 30 More…

Dodd, Baucus React to Obama’s Proposed Bank Tax

Here’s the statement from Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.), chairman of the Banking Committee, supporting the Obama administration’s proposal to apply a  tax on the nation’s financial giants in order to repay taxpayers for the 2008 bailout.

Wall Street owes a great debt to the American public and we

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Pressure on Baucus to Fight for CHIP

A prominent children’s healthcare advocate in Montana is putting pressure on Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.), chairman of the Finance Committee, to fight for a provision of the Senate’s health reform bill that would preserve the Children’s Health Insurance Program. House Democrats are pushing to terminate CHIP in 2014, More…