BCT Editorial – 2/15/05

This page was last updated on February 15, 2005.

It’s all for show; Editorial; Beaver County Times; February 15, 2005.

Below is a detailed critique of the subject editorial.

It’s kind of hard for a kid to take his dad seriously about the evils of smoking and drinking while Dad is puffing on a cigarette and holding a can of beer in his hand.

“Yet that is exactly what President Bush is doing in regard to his lectures about the need of the federal government to cut spending.

“The president’s spending plan calls for cutting spending on 150 programs, which the administration estimates will result in a savings of some $20 billion. It’s a phony lecture in tons of ways because of what is left out - the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the cost of partially privatizing Social Security and reform of the Alternative Minimum Tax, to name but three - and it didn’t take Bush long to reveal his fiscally irresponsible ways by threatening to veto any cuts in the Medicare prescription-drug plan that he pushed through in his first term.”

[RWC] I believe President Bush hasn’t done anywhere enough cutting, but it’s incorrect to portray him as a big spender, the drug plan aside. When you look at non-security “discretionary” spending, President Bush has cut spending increases every year. In President Clinton’s last year, this category increased 15%. In President Bush’s five budgets, this category increased 6%, 5%, 4%, 1%, and decreased 1% in the 2006 budget. Slowing the rate of increase isn’t the goal, but it’s a start.

“Originally, the plan was supposed to cost $400 billion over 10 years. A few months after it became law, the cost zoomed to an estimated $534 billion. But because of an accounting gimmick, the $534 billion price tag was still too low. The more realistic figure is now $720 billion.”

[RWC] I opposed the prescription drug plan and I still do. My comments below are not intended to defend the program, but to illustrate the hypocrisy and partisanship in the editorial.

You have to give the editorial board credit for gall. Over and over we read Times editorials clamoring for a “healthcare solution” – Times-speak for national healthcare – and now the Times complains about the cost. Personally, I don’t believe for one second the editorial board cares about the cost at all.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office made the $400 billion estimate in 2003, though the White House didn’t dispute it at the time.

The “accounting gimmick” was no such thing. When the bill was being worked on in 2003, it had an estimate for the following 10 years (2004 – 2013). Because the plan would not go into effect for two years, the first two years (2004 & 2005) had no costs for the plan. This was no secret; everyone knew it. Skip ahead two years to 2005. This 10-year estimate now includes 10 full years (2006 – 2015) of the drug plan. That accounts for the jump from $534 billion to $720 billion.

In fact, the editorial is guilty of its own “accounting gimmick.” In case you missed it, the editorial reported the spending cuts only for the first year, but reported the drug plan cost for 10 years. The idea was to make it sound like the cuts were insignificant. While the 10-year cuts of about $137 billion don’t come close to offsetting the drug plan costs, we deserve to have both numbers reported for equivalent time periods.

For what it’s worth, anyone who believes the cost of this misguided program won’t continue to skyrocket is kidding himself. Even ignoring other factors – like interfering in the marketplace, the cost will continue to rise because of our aging population. As more and more people become eligible for Medicare, the cost will increase. What’s truly amazing is that the very people complaining about the cost of providing drugs to a subset of the population are the same people claiming we should have a national healthcare system to pay for all healthcare costs for everyone.

“With eye-popping numbers like that at a time of enormous deficits, some members of Congress are calling for the program to be scaled back or eliminated. Bush will have none of that talk and broke out the veto threat.

“Keep this in mind in the coming weeks and months as Bush pushes and brags about his window-dressing budget cuts. It’s all for show.”

[RWC] Despite all the wailing and gnashing of teeth, did you notice the editorial proposed no solutions? It complained of “window-dressing cuts,” but didn’t volunteer what would be more than window dressing.

“It’s all for show” also applies to the content of this editorial. I’ll refrain from speculating what the editorial would have said if President Bush had a “D” after his name.