As behind-the-scenes budget negotiations continued, the Senate on Thursday voted overwhelmingly to end subsidies for ethanol. Sen. Bernie Sanders said that would save taxpayers billions of dollars and ease pressure on food prices.  On Wednesday, Sanders introduced legislation to force federal regulators to crack down on oil speculators. On Thursday, he grilled members of the pro-industry Nuclear Regulatory Commission pushing the federal government into a legal fight over the fate of Vermont Yankee.  During a busy week, the under-the-radar budget talks remained, as Sanders put it, "the elephant in the room."

Budget Negotiations Vice President Biden and congressional negotiators continued closed-door meetings on a deficit reduction plan that could pave the way for a vote in Congress to raise the cap on federal borrowing.  The Senate Budget Committee, meanwhile, huddled on its own plan. The latest draft floated by Chairman Kent Conrad no longer includes a millionaires surtax first proposed by Sanders but opposed by another member of the committee. Sanders told Congressional Quarterly on Thursday that although he is sorry to see the millionaires surtax go, but added that he is "comfortable" with Conrad's latest plan because half of the deficit reduction is achieved as a result of increased revenue. "I think we have made some significant progress," he said. "If we can end a wide variety of loopholes that the wealthy and large corporations benefit from, I can live with not having a millionaire surtax."

AARP on Social Security The self-styled senior citizens lobby, AARP, said it was open to cuts in Social Security benefits. "It bothers me," Sanders said, "but doesn't surprise me."  

Stop Oil Speculation Sanders on Wednesday introduced legislation to make federal commodity regulators halt excessive oil speculation that has driven up gasoline prices. A provision in last year's Wall Street reform law required federal regulators to clamp down on speculators, but the Commodity Futures Trading Commission has refused to do so.  Partly as a result of the failure to enforce the law, the national average price for a gallon of gasoline is way up. The prices spiked although supplies are greater and demand lower. "We have a responsibility to do everything we can to lower gas prices so that they reflect the fundamentals of supply and demand and bring needed relief to the American people," Sanders  told Ed Schultz. Watch the interview.

Sanders to NRC: Butt Out Sanders on Thursday faulted the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for asking the Department of Justice to intervene in a lawsuit over the state of Vermont's effort to shut down the aging Vermont Yankee nuclear plant.  "I was deeply disturbed that the commissioners of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission refused to make public what, as I understand it, was a 3-to-2 vote recommending that the Department of Justice take Entergy Corp.'s  side in the lawsuit against Vermont," Sanders said Thursday after the Senate environment committee hearing. "The federal government should not intervene in the lawsuit that Entergy has filed against the state of Vermont.  Federal law is very clear that states have the authority to reject nuclear power for economic reasons and that is what the Vermont state Senate did last year by a strong 26-to-4 bipartisan vote," the senator added.  To watch excerpts from the hearing, click here.