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   Dan Savage, the brilliant and foul-mouthed sex columnist, has become one of the most important ethicists in America. Are we screwed?
 The federal government is supposed to issue new rules about debt levels for students in for-profit colleges. In the meantime, the states are working on their own regulations.
 Washingtons budget hawks want to decimate the federal workforce to shrink the deficit. It will have the opposite effect.
 There arent nearly enough counterterrorism experts to instruct all of Americas police. So we got these guys instead.
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September 11, 2009
SNOWE EYES ARBITRARY CUTS FOR CUTS' SAKE.... Throughout the debate over health care reform, a variety of price tags have been thrown around. Some lawmakers talked about a $1 trillion figure over 10 years. The AP called it $1.5 trillion. Last week, there was talk about $700 billion. In his big speech, President Obama said $900 billion over the next decade. The Senate's most moderate Republican has another number in mind.
If this sounds familiar, it's because Senate GOP moderates did the same thing during the debate over an economic stimulus package in February. Economists saw a trillion-dollar hole in the U.S. economy. Centrists, with an odd fondness for round numbers, kept wanting to shrink the size of the recovery response, just because. They wanted a smaller number, just so they could say it was smaller. They eyed $100 billion in cuts, because $100 billion had a nice ring to it. They were thrilled to fall under an $800 billion ceiling, not for any policy goal, but because it sounded "reasonable." Ideally, we'd have policymakers identify the problem, come up with a solution, and then figure out how to pay for it. Instead, we have a few too many policymakers come up with a price tag first, whether it's sufficient in solving the problem or not. It is, in other words, entirely arbitrary. Obama is eyeing $900 billion for health care reform. Snowe is now thinking about "$800 billion or below." Why? Because it just sounds better. Less is necessarily superior to more, the argument goes, for vague, personal reasons that have nothing to do with addressing the problem at hand. I realize we're talking about a lot of money here, but the difference between a $900 billion reform package and an $800 billion package is $10 billion a year. Given the size of the U.S. economy, the federal government's budget, and the willingness of lawmakers to spend freely when it was debt-financed Bush-era initiatives on the line, an additional $10 billion a year to help Americans have quality, affordable health coverage is more than reasonable. Making health care reform worse, based on nothing but capricious standards on what price tags sound nice is absurd. —Steve Benen 10:45 AM Permalink | Trackbacks | Comments (16)
Comments
if you havent got any ideas -- and has snowe ever had one? on anything? -- you can always cut up somebody else's... Posted by: neill on September 11, 2009 at 10:50 AM | PERMALINKWhy are the voters of Maine so infatuated with this self-important idiot? Posted by: Steve LaBonne on September 11, 2009 at 10:56 AM | PERMALINKYet another reason not to compromise until it is time to compromise. i have trouble getting too worked up over what Snowe is doing. sure it is wrong and illogical. but show me the math behind Obama's $900B - show me he didn't similarly pick a round number that was $100B less than the $1T House Dems had been bandying about solely because it was a round number less than $1T. moreover, he got nothing for it. he bid against himself (more accurately his own party) to try and score political points for the plan. so explain to me again how it is wrong for Snowe to do the same thing? yes it is a stupid way to make policy. which is why Obama shouldn't have started the reverse auction in which Snowe is now happily bidding. Posted by: zeitgeist on September 11, 2009 at 10:58 AM | PERMALINKSomeone on another site mentioned the 2.3 trillion the Pentagon could not find on Sept 10/that everyone forgot about on Sept 11th. Wonder how the hunt is going for that - it would help pay for healthcare. Posted by: JS on September 11, 2009 at 10:58 AM | PERMALINKah, yes. just a few months ago republicans were calling reform dead on arrival because of the economy. Then it was dead again because of the outrage of the "American people" in August. one speech by Obama and they're saying let's talk about this. we're 80% in agreement, maybe if we lower the price tag, etc.etc. remind me, how many republican votes did that compromising garner in the stimulus bill? Posted by: wtf on September 11, 2009 at 11:03 AM | PERMALINKHas anyone, including the 'figure-tossers' considered the fact that healthy workers are productive workers -- therefore producing more taxable profit for their companies -- and that the government receives no tax revenue for uncompensated sick days? Both of these factors do something -- anybody out there have a good estimate of how much? ... Anybody? ... Anybody? ... Ezra? -- towards lessening the cost to the government of decent health care. Yes, Obama came up with an arbitrary number below 1T. That was a good tactic for a national speech. Hopefully, now that Dems are forming the legislation, the price tag will be $999.99B and the actual cost will stay under 1.5T for ten years. Yes, the obvious Republican assault (from any number of them) will have money as its only substance. It plays well and provides cover for the Blue Dogs. Posted by: Bob Johnson on September 11, 2009 at 11:14 AM | PERMALINK Can't somebody find another project to better utilize Olympia Snowe's time ? Posted by: Joe Friday on September 11, 2009 at 11:20 AM | PERMALINK It's not just the amount of money they try to strip out of the package, but which monies they strip out. I realize we're talking about a lot of money here... I remember when it used to be "a million here, a million there" that added up to "real money". Now it's "a hundred billion here, a hundred billion there". Just sayin'. Posted by: converse on September 11, 2009 at 11:54 AM | PERMALINKIn fact, versions of the quote using "billion" and not "million" date back as far as 1917: Why does Maine vote for Susan Collins? Seriously, this woman drives me nuts with her voice. And it's not like a New England thing, does she have the same dytonia condition that Diane Rehm has? I wouldn't vote for her just based on that. As far as Olympia, when's she up for election? And did she opppose any of Bush's stuff because of the price tag? And I don't mean giving it lip service, I mean actually voting against it. She looks pretty old. Hopefully she'll retire soon. Posted by: warren terrah on September 11, 2009 at 1:38 PM | PERMALINKUnfortunately, by Senate standards, she's not that old (62), but she is certaiu Posted by: dcsusie on September 11, 2009 at 3:34 PM | PERMALINKCan someone in the blogging community do some research and find out which bills Snowe and other moronic so-called 'centrists' have voted for bills that expanded the federal budget? Once that list is formulated, we can all insist that the 'media' bobble heads ask the 'esteemed' congress critters 'why' the hypocrisy. I remember at least one, where the Estate Tax laws were 'changed' recently without an offset. I'm sure there are plenty other examples. It would make for nice theater... Of course they will dodge the question and respond with a non-answer, but that's where Jon Stewart comes in... maybe he can get them to embarrass themselves. Posted by: bruno on September 11, 2009 at 9:44 PM | PERMALINKIn connected announcement, Nike's new motto for Tiger Woods is Just do me. Posted by: Golf Clubs on September 21, 2010 at 1:02 PM | PERMALINKPost a comment
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