Baucus the go-to senator on health AND climate? Harkin predicts passage of plan with public option

UPDATE, Sept. 17: Instead of bipartisan support, Baucus's health-care bill got bipartisan opposition when he introduced it Sept. 16. Chuck Todd and Mark Murray of NBC First Read observe, "What does it say about today’s Republican Party when Baucus’ bill seeks the middle ground, lowers the price tag, doesn’t contain the so-called public option, and actually lowers health costs -- and yet not a single Republican, even [Olympia] Snowe, will embrace it? Indeed, the middle may very well be the loneliest place to be in America these days. In our politics, almost everyone seems to be on one side or another, with very few (Snowe, Collins, Ben Nelson, Blanche Lincoln, etc.) in between. The same seems true of our society, where everyone is looking out for his or her own self-interest, rather than the greater good. Baucus’ biggest problem may have been seeking the middle ground in a country where the middle is seemingly lost."

A powerful, increasingly conservative senator from a state with vast rural areas, Democrat Max Baucus of Montana, has become the bellwether of the Senate, first on health care and now on climate change, reports Lisa Lerer of Politico.

"His power play could put Baucus at the helm of the Obama administration’s domestic agenda, giving an unpredictable Montana Democrat control over legislative proposals that could define the Democratic Party for years to come," Lerer writes.

But on climate change, the Finance Committee chairman is in a turf battle with liberal Democratic Sen. Sen. Barbara Boxer of California, chair of the Environment and Public Works Committee. "Boxer and Baucus bring dramatically different approaches to the climate issue, so combining their ideas won’t be easy," Lerer writes. (Read more)

Meanwhile, liberal Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, the new chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, "declared that a health care reform bill would pass both houses of Congress 'by Christmas,' and that it would include a government-run, not-for-profit health insurance plan," Chase Martyn reports for the Iowa Independent.