The Upper Whorehouse goes down (on) K Street

Senate Democrats "rejoiced." That's how the NY Times described their reaction to an impersonal budget analysis performed by a faceless crew of soulless government accountants who had delivered that most compelling, most pivotal, most decisive news of all: that Max Baucus' Finance Committee's health-care bill "would reduce deficits."

Well thank heaven for that. For years the federal government under unified Republican control esteemed and executed fiscal responsibility as its very highest ideal, and we sure wouldn't want to interrupt their magnificent record of unyielding prudence.

So rejoice, ye Dems of easy amusement, who, after countless years of anguished debate and scores of sensible solutions, still can't get it right. Baucus' bill creeps stealthily toward a trillion dollars in public spending but nonetheless leaves 25 million inhabitants uninsured ten years from now, while permitting private costs to march ever upward.

"Within minutes of receiving the report," the Times continued, "Mr. Baucus, the chief author of the bill, was on the Senate floor," doing the wretchedly expected -- "boasting." Dissembled Max, as only Max can dissemble: "The report is good news. Our balanced approach in the Finance Committee to health reform, I think, has paid off."

By "balanced," Max of course didn't mean bipartisanship. He meant the health-care industry and Congressional Democrats. Yet by "paid off," he meant exactly that, even if, perhaps, in a slipping Freudian kind of way.

You've already read, no doubt, of the nearly $4 million that Sen. Baucus has scooped up in health-industrial "contributions" over the last few years, as well as the accompanying senatorial graft and those freely dispersed piles of corporate cash filling the reelection coffers of the lower chamber. All of it is indeed "paying off"; yet this -- Max's health-care bill, smothering under layers of well-heeled special interests -- is only the Congressional beginning under President Obama's frustrated overall management.

Next is regulatory reform, for which Obama has been begging Congress and the latter has unfailingly delayed, rebuffed, abused, or diluted. And if you wish to know how, possibly, after the worst financial crisis in 70 years, Congress could be taking such a casual attitude, then just take a gander at this tidy explanatory breakdown, from the Politico:

Of the $10.6 million the [private financial sector] has given to sitting senators this year, more than $7.7 million has gone to Democrats. [Chuck] Schumer got his $1.65 million; his New York colleague Kirsten Gillibrand took in $886,000; Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada received $814,000; Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd of Connecticut scored $603,000; Colorado freshman Michael Bennet got $401,000; and Agriculture Committee Chairman Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas -- who will have a big say on the derivatives portion of regulatory reform -- got $336,000.

The Senate Banking Committee's ranking Republican, Richard Shelby, has actually been offered less in bribes than Sen. Lincoln, who isn't even on the banking committee. In other words, the barbarians now stand eagerly at the proper partisan gates.

So we'll get regulatory reform all right, cooked just like the barbarians are ordering it -- just like we're getting health-care reform.

Regarding which, only 29 Senate Democrats and one Independent are willing to affix their names to a letter addressed to the majority leadership suggesting that -- hey guys, anyone listening? -- maybe a cost-controlling, barbarian-competing government option would be advisable. Again, from the Politico, the sober 30 are:

Sherrod Brown; John D. Rockefeller; Russell D. Feingold; Patrick J. Leahy; Daniel K. Akaka; Tom Udall; Kristen E. Gillibrand; Roland W. Burris; Ron Wyden; Debbie Stabenow; Barbara Boxer; Sheldon Whitehouse; Michael F. Bennet; Dianne Feinstein; Jack Reed; Jeff Merkley; Frank R. Lautenberg; Benjamin L. Cardin; Al Franken; Robert P. Casey Jr.; Barbara A. Mikulski; Daniel K. Inouye; Edward E. Kaufman; Arlen Specter [my emphasis]; Maria Cantwell; Robert Menendez; Bernard Sanders (I); John F. Kerry; Herb Kohl; and Paul Kirk.

Unrelated but related to all this comes a story from the Congressional Quarterly: "A tide of anger and dismay is rippling down K Street as the Obama administration implements a new policy" -- "announced quietly" -- "limiting the roles of lobbyists on federal advisory committees.... [T]he White House views the move as a key step in rolling back what officials see as the open-door policy for K Street created in previous years." Said, in response, one lobbyist: "There is fury. Absolute fury" directed at the White House.

"K Street is now mulling its next steps.... Many expect an effort to gin up opposition from Congressional panels.... [Corporate] officials are particularly eyeing the Finance Committee, where Chairman Max Baucus [is] believed on K Street to be closely following the issue."

So we end where we started, with the fetching Mr. Baucus and his boys-come-hither look. If he were the only whore in Congress, that'd be one thing. Unfortunately, this Congress is pretty much in toto just one immense whorehouse.