Republicans big FAIL: "Despite Calling CBO ‘God,’ GOP Rejects Politically Inconvenient CBO Score..."

[ProSense]

Despite Calling CBO ‘God,’ GOP Rejects Politically Inconvenient CBO Score Of Baucus Bill

The CBO’s score of the Senate Finance Committee’s health care reform bill isn’t winning over any converts. After a year of building up the budget office’s ‘bipartisan’ credibility– Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) has repeatedly equated the CBO with ‘God’ — Republicans are now dismissing the office’s politically inconvenient conclusions.

The Congressional Budget Office estimated that the new version of the Senate Finance Committee’s health bill “will result in a net reduction in federal budget deficits of $81 billion over the 2010-2019 period” and would actually “reduce the federal budgetary commitment to health care.” But Republicans are stressing that the CBO analysis is “preliminary,” insisting that Democrats have a secret plan to scrap the existing health care legislation that “expands the role of the federal government in the personal health care decisions of every American.”

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The Baucus bill requires some substantial changes, but the Republican effort to invalidate the CBO scores is highly disingenuous. It’s hard to argue that you support bipartisan deficit-neutral health care reform and oppose a measure that incorporates pages of Republican ideas and actually reduces the deficit by $81 billion over 10 years. To make that argument, one must pretend that the Baucus bill is something it’s not.

To be clear, the bill is far from perfect and many progressives have their share of complaints. As Jonathan Cohn points out, the coverage provisions are “significantly lower than the projections from the House bill.” “In raw numbers, it’s the difference between 25 million people (Senate Finance bill) and 17 million (House bills) still uninsured ten years from now.” The Committee has some $71 billion (before it meets President Obama’s cost threshold of $900 billion) and could invest in higher affordability credits or improve affordability measures by allowing the Exchanges to “negotiate with plans for lower bids, encourage plans to form select networks, and exclude plans that do not offer good value and cost-effectiveness (PDF).”

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[SoFlaJet]

1. PS, they have gone from the Party Of No

to one of complete and total irrelevance. They THINK that their going against what 2 outta 3 Americans actually want (including half of their own party) is somehow going to get them back in control of either the House or the Senate-they are delusional.

[Cha]

10. The greed has always clouded their

thinking.

[CTyankee]

2. Of course!

Backed against a wall, they are desperate. This is getting to be even more of a joke than it already has been...

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

3. "Convenient Budget Office" Use only when absolutely convenient

[tridim]

4. Bob Dole is wondering why they're ignoring him.

Bob Dole. Bob DOLE!

[Historic NY]

6. ask Bob dole...someone ask him.

[damntexdem]

5. The GOP is irrelevant. The issue is the effect on Blue Dogs.

Will the CBO report give some sufficient cover to support reform?

[Solomon]

7. Good post. I've been thinking the same thing ever since the new

statistics came out. Hannity used them repeatedly as the most credible source of why "Obama" is spending too much money, but now he's silent about the new report.

Really pisses me off that they get away with doing this kind of thing routinely.

[avaistheone1]

8. Did the CBO ever get around to scoring single payer.

Single payer is where the real savings are.

[Canuckistanian]

9. I think they're scoring a single-payer model

But it was given a very low priority.

[Vincardog]

11. I think they are refusing to score a single-payer model because it is the most cost efficient