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NIA-MALIKA HENDERSON
Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine), who voted for a version of the health care bill that came out of the Senate Finance Committee, says she has major problems with bill as it stands now and would not support it.
In meetings with President Barack Obama that came after Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) indicated he had 60 votes needed to end the debate, Snowe pleaded for more time to consider and fix the bill, and Obama encouraged her to vote for it.
"I have been in countless meetings and telephone calls and meetings with the president and a number of people across the aisle," she said on CBS's "Face the Nation". "The problem is the bill became bigger...you have a whole new layer of taxes...you have a 1 percent Medicare payroll tax on small businesses...this will be devastating for small business as well...I said to the president please give us the time, come back after the New Year...it's like the last train leaving the station, we're going to dump everything in it."
