Max Baucus gave his girlfriend a $14,000 taxpayer funded raise

  Last week it was reported that Max Baucus had nominated his girlfriend for United States attorney in Montana along with two other people. He claimed that she was nominated on her merit and not on his relationship with her. Melodee Hanes, Max Baucus’s girlfriend, withdrew her name from consideration once Baucus admitted that he was in a relationship with her.

  It now appears as though there may have been another reason why she withdrew her name from consideration for the position. When Baucus and Hanes became romantically involved, shortly after both dumped their spouses, Baucus gave Hanes a $14,000 raise and took her on a taxpayer funded trip to Southeast Asia and the Middle East. This trip on the taxpayers dollar could have been justified as a foreign policy jaunt if it wasn’t for the fact that Hanes is not a foreign policy expert, and had very little, if any, foreign policy experience.

  On the surface it appears as if Max Baucus hooked up with this recent divorcee whom he had been working with, gave her a raise, and took her on a little vacation that you and I were forced to pay for. This reminds me of that episode of Seinfeld where George ends up having sex with a woman that works for him and in the middle of the sex he screams, “I am giving you a raise!” There really isn’t much difference here.

  And this isn’t the first employee that he tried to hook up with. Christine Niedermeier tried to sue Baucus after he fired her for refusing his sexual advances but the case was thrown out on a technicality.

  His defense is that this raise was in line with other raises that his office doled out. That does not make it any more palatable in my opinion. The notion that while most Americans are struggling in this economy to make ends meet, the government is taking their tax money and giving out raises to the politically and sexually connected few does not fly in my book. As a matter of fact, I find it despicable.