Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has named his picks to the "super committee" charged with making deficit reduction recommendations.

Reid named Washington Sen. Patty Murray and center-right Max Baucus, who the Post's Rosalind Helderman today (8/10/11) calls a "natural choice," given that he chairs the Finance Committee. The New York Times is a little more helpful, pointing out that Baucus

broke with other Democrats and supported tax cuts enacted in 2001 under President George W. Bush. He also worked with Republicans in 2003 to pass legislation that added a prescription drug benefit to Medicare.

This is important for anyone who thinks that the tax cuts and drug benefit contributed greatly to the deficit problem.

Reid also picked Massachusetts' John Kerry, about whom the Post writes:

Kerry comes as something of a surprise, since he has focused more closely on foreign relations. However, as a respected former presidential candidate, his selection could help appease liberals.

I'm not sure how Kerry would "appease liberals."  In this particular case, the main issues are protecting Social Security and Medicare. And as of Sunday on Meet the Press, Kerry's view on that was that

the real problem for our country is not the short-term debt. We can deal with that. It's the long-term debt. It's the structural debt of Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid measured against the demographics of our nation.

It's not clear how picking someone with that misleading perspective is supposed to "appease liberals."

In a story about the Senate Finance Committee voting down two amendments that would have added a public option to the committee's healthcare bill, New York Times reporters Robert Pear and Jackie Calmes (9/29/09) write, "The votes vindicated the middle-of-the-road approach taken by the committee chairman, Senator Max Baucus, Democrat of Montana."

The Times just had a poll that found 65 percent of respondents were in favor of a public option, with just 26 percent opposed.  To call the approach favored by the rightmost one-quarter of public opinion "middle-of-the-road"--well, maybe someone ought to take away Pear and Calmes' car keys and call them a cab.

Conservative Democratic Sen. Max Baucus of Montana unveiled his long-awaited health reform proposal yesterday, the results of weeks of negotiations among the Senate Finance Committee's so-called "Gang of Six"--three Democrats from the right-wing of their party and three moderate-to-conservative Republicans. The bill (unsurprisingly) does not include a public option and could end up leaving middle-income Americans paying too much for health insurance (Think Progress, 9/15/09). At the same time, no Republican--including those in the Baucus' Gang--has indicated that they intend to vote for this bill.

But some of the early media coverage seems to find it encouraging that the Baucus bill pleases almost no one. The Washington Post's Ceci Connolly presents that view today ("From Finance Chief, a Bill That May Weather the Blows"), with the lead: "On the surface, it appears that no one is happy with Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.)--and that may be the best news President Obama has had in months."

What exactly is the good news? Connolly explains that liberals unions "fumed," but more importantly, "the fragile coalition of major industry leaders and interest groups central to refashioning the nation's $2.5 trillion health-care system remains intact." These "influential players" have not found "reasons to kill the effort." Quite the opposite: "Most enticing was the prospect of 30 million new customers." Well, that is good news--if you happen to believe that pleasing health insurance companies is the key to passing meaningful reform of that industry. Here you see the worldview of the Washington Post in action.

Meanwhile, USA Today's front page headline in the print edition (9/17/09) is "Bill Seen as Step in the 'Right Direction.'" This is a strange conclusion to reach about a bill that no one seems to like. The "right direction" comment was made by Maine Republican Sen. Olympia Snowe, a Maine Republican included in Baucus' Gang of Six, who the paper tells us isn't even sure she'll support the Baucus plan anyway. On their website USA Today has changed the headline to read, "Bill Elates Few but Seen as Progress"-- an improvement, but still a strange way to describe the state of the debate. Unless, of course, one sees Max Baucus, Olympia Snowe or the insurance industry as the most important voices in that debate.

It is quite telling that, even considering how in Ed Schultz's May 7 MSNBC interview of Physician for a National Health Program Margaret Flowers and Sen. Debbie Stabenow, he "slaps a gratuitous insult on the heroines of Code Pink" and "says he's against protesting and "getting arrested" as a rule but thinks it's OK if doctors in suits and 'educated professional people' do it" and even "pretends to believe (or actually believes) that President Obama favors considering the possibility of creating single-payer healthcare," activist and author David Swanson (OpEd News, 5/7/09) "can't recall a better corporate news video segment in at least the past decade":

The heart of this story is the gaping chasm between majority opinion and the corporate agenda of the United States Senate....

Ed goes after the health insurance companies, the pharmaceutical companies and the HMOs. He plays video of activist Kevin Zeese speaking up at the recent Senate Finance Committee hearing and being arrested. He explains perfectly what single-payer healthcare is. (I recommend this flyer.) And he denounces the anti-democratic exclusion of single-payer advocates by committee chairman Max Baucus.

And then Ed brings on Margaret Flowers, who absolutely nails every question he asks, and he asks the right questions. Flowers lists the polls showing that over 60 percent of Americans and 60 percent of physicians want single-payer.

Schultz's choice to air Flowers telling viewers "that the next Senate hearing is on March 12 and that advocates are asking for at least one supporter of single-payer to be included," has Swanson exclaiming that "that sort of mention of an upcoming event and very nearly inclusion of exactly what people can do to improve their country is rare indeed on our televisions."