Sens. Byron Dorgan of North Dakota and Dick Durbin of Illinois have been working intensely on a jobs bill for more than a month, talking with relevant committee leaders and other members and dispatching aides to dozens of other meetings in the hopes of crafting a bill that could get through the Senate quickly.

And when they walked into a meeting in the office of Reid (D-Nev.) on Jan. 22, they thought they were about to cross the finish line — the Dorgan-Durbin plan would be blessed by the small group of senators in the room, presented to the full Democratic Caucus on Jan. 28 and then taken straight to the floor for a vote.

But Montana Sen. Max Baucus had other ideas.

The chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, where the health care bill was debated for months last year, surprised the senators gathered in Reid’s office by suggesting he wanted a chance to mark up portions of the bill under his committee’s jurisdiction before it went to the floor, according to several people who attended the meeting.

via Democrats squabble over jobs bill – Manu Raju and Meredith Shiner – POLITICO.com.

Here is what I have to assume, Baucus wants to do what he did with the moderate health care bill: water it down, send it through weeks of useless negotiations and see how his constituents (aka industry and angry tea baggers from the right) feel about it before he comes up with a bill that no one likes. Now mind you, the President and the Democrats are under pressure to get more done for job creation. Durbin and Dorgan were proactive and Baucus inserts his ass on the tail end of the process (no pun intended). One of these kids is doin’ their own thing.