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Nelson backs Baucus bill

Posted Sep 16, 2009 by William March

Updated Sep 16, 2009 at 01:59 PM

Florida Sen. Bill Nelson is lining up behind a health care reform bill with no public option intended to win Republican votes and placate the moderate Democratic “blue dogs.”

Nelson praised the bill, produced by Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, in Senate floot remarks today, distributed by his office.

Nelson called it “a starting point ... This isn’t the end-all and be-all, this is a starting point.”

The excerpts of Nelson’s remarks distributed by his office didn’t mention the absence from the bill of a public option, or government insurance program available to those who can’t get private insurance. Some Democrats have considered a public option indispensable to true reform and are angry the Baucus bill doesn’t include it.

Nelson, even though he’s a member of the Finance Committee, the most powerful in the Senate on the health care issue, has not joined the thick of the fray over the issue. But he has been saying recently that a bill with a public option can’t get 60 Senate votes, a requirement for passage of almost any disputed piece of legislation in the Senate.

He quoted two presidents, John F. Kennedy and Abraham Lincoln, in his Senate remarks, saying popular support is necessary for the bill to pass.
His Kennedy quote, in which the late president was talking about health care legislation: “The consent of the citizens of this country is essential if this or any other piece of progressive legislation is going to be passed.”