More Fuel for the Fire

There are two developments in the news that are likely to feed into long-running debates:

• House Democrats want to add Medicare changes to the bill expanding the children's health insurance program, primarily by eliminating co-pays and deductibles for preventive care while reducing payments to private "Medicare Advantage" plans. President Bush has already threatened to veto the children's health bill as it is, and he'll probably like this idea even less. But the House idea already has backing from AARP and the AMA, as private insurers mobilize against it. House leaders say they'll keep the bill within pay-as-you-go rules, but the key will be seeing how the long-term cost projections turn out.
• The Congressional Budget Office examines the budget impact of the Bush tax cuts and says the short-term economic stimulation has "largely dissipated by now" and that at this point their impact on the economy "is likely to be modest." The agency is also estimating the cuts added $46 billion to debt service costs in 2007. But if you brace yourself and read the letter (it's only three pages, but that's three very dense pages) you'll see most of it is really about how difficult it is to get good data on this question.