Ezra Klein posts The $900 billion mistake, about how Barack Obama picked that number out of thin air in his September 2009 speech on health care, as to what health care reform should cost. That arbitrary number has flummoxed Democrats in coming up with a plan:
The number sprang from Obama’s September speech laying out his own plan on health-care reform. “Add it all up,” he said before a joint session of Congress, “and the plan I’m proposing will cost around $900 billion over 10 years.” The plan he proposed, however, did not mention the price tag, and the president did not include any specifics about how that price tag was reached….
It was, they hoped, something of a political sweet spot. It calmed some moderates by showing that the White House was willing to push back on the ambitions of more liberal members of Congress and pleased some liberals by showing that the White House wasn’t letting the chaos of August distract them from the need for an ambitious bill.
But once that number entered the process, it began guiding the process.
The problem isn’t the $900 billion number, it’s the President who threw it out there to find a political sweet spot.
And the Democrats who accepted that number as gospel because they thought they could sell it politically.
And the mainstream media which “oohed” and “aahed” at Obama’s ability to turn-around public opinion for a couple of days after the speech.
And Ezra Klein, who called this “Obama’s most effective policy speech by far.” (Heh)
But that political sweet spot turned out to be sour. The public doesn’t want to spend $900 billion on a massive government restructuring of our health care system. The public knows that whatever the projected number, the real number will be much, much higher. It always is with government programs.
The problem isn’t that Obama picked a number out of nowhere and left others to figure it out.
The problem is that on 11/04/2008 the nation picked Obama out of nowhere and now we all are left to figure it out.
UPDATE: 100% Plus Taxation Key To Permanent Dem Majority
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Related Posts:
Obama Doesn’t Really Have A “Plan”
The Have Your Cake And Eat It Too Speech
Shocking Lack of Respect
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Comments
Home run on the truth as usual. Wow you can make a point! Keep up the good and informative work. It does make a difference. Thanks for speaking for so many of us and God Bless and Keep You. (The God of Heaven).
You nailed it:
"The problem isn't that Obama picked a number out of nowhere and left others to figure it out.
The problem is that on 11/04/2008 the nation picked Obama out of nowhere and now we all are left to figure it out."
Just wish it was the nail in the coffin of this Presidency.
By the by…
Nearly 200 top positions in the administration remain vacant a full year after President Obama was elected. USA Today reports the backlog puts President Obama behind his predecessors in terms of the amount of time taken to fill key jobs.
And, ironically…
There is no one permanently in charge of Medicare or Medicaid at a time when the president is pushing health care reform in Congress. Mark McClellan, a former administrator for the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services, says the timing isn't good, "without a permanent administrator in place."
LINK
It can't be because there's a shortage of corrupt, neo-Communist D.C. or Chicago bureaucrats out there to fill those posts.
It has to be laziness.
What mindless partisan hackery William Jacobson engages in–in post after knee-jerk post. Reciting Rasmussen polls as if there were no others. Asserting that the country opposes the Obama plan when polls actually show an even split (not to mention a majority who favor the public option). And suggesting that Obama came out of nowhere when in fact he was daily news for TWO YEARS before the 2008 election. The real candidate from nowhere was the Quitta from Wasilla, who was unheard of eight weeks before the election, and refused to even do a press conference, lest she be exposed.
EK is such a shameless Obama cheerleader.
Obama doesn't need agency heads. He has his czars.
Agency heads might actually get in the way, as they would demand to be in the loop for the things being done under their supposed responsibility.
EasyOpinions.blogspot.com
Hey Captian Greendonutzzz your deflector shield is broken.