Shocker: The Dems are Cheating on Healthcare Costing

You remember that healthcare reform that was originally projected at over $1 trillion over the next 10 years? Now there is a special price: Only $871 billion! But you have to act fast to take advantage of this discount, or so insist House leaders.

Good news everybody! You remember that healthcare reform that was originally projected at over $1 trillion over the next 10 years, and who knows how much in the years after that?

Now there is a special price, for special customers like you! Only $871 billion!  But you have to act fast to take advantage of this discount, or so insist House leaders.

House leaders have cut the cost of their health-care overhaul to around $871 billion over the next decade, Democratic sources said Tuesday night, and were working to line up votes for the package with the aim of bringing it before the full House early next month.

The $871 billion estimate -- well under the $900 billion limit set by President Obama -- is the latest of several versions scored by congressional budget analysts, according to a Democratic aide, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss private talks. The measure would include a government-run insurance plan that pays providers at rates tied to Medicare, the aide added.

You wouldn't buy a set of Ginsu knives under this kind of high-pressure tactic - and you sure should not buy the latest Dem proposal. The devil as always lies in the details, that phrase "pays providers at rates tied to Medicare."

This gets technical, but bear with me.

Back when the Republicans still ruled the House, they pushed through a series of cuts in doctors' Medicare reimbursement rates. Those cuts never went into effect. Instead they were rolled over year by year into the future - conveniently making future budget deficits look smaller, without ever affecting the actual current deficit in the here and now.

The doctors get their money, actual cash folding money, and the legislators get their CBO-scored reduction in future deficits. Everybody wins, except of course for unborn taxpayers. But they don't vote.

The new Democratic majority has promised to undo those postponed GOP cuts.The cost of the so-called "doc fix"? $250-$300 billion over the next 10 years.

Democrats have until now refused to count the "doc fix" as part of the cost of healthcare. They promise to find the money somewhere, at some future date. That's chutzpah enough.

But now look at this: to (mis)represent the cost of their public option, they are ignoring their own intention to raise Medicare payments (that's the price of buying the AMA's support for Obamacare) - and using the never-implemented Republican numbers as proof of their own fiscal rectitude. Amazing. And one more warning that the costs projected today will bear scant resemblance to the real costs of the plan when and if it is put into effect.

My suggestion: whatever the number you hear for the cost of this Democratic project ... double it.