Obama Trying to STRONG-ARM Congressional Budget Office into Better Health Care Numbers

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Our Bully-in-Chief is at it again. His new target is the Congressional Budget Office (CBO). Remember last week when the CBO testified before Congress about Obamacare being a budget buster, and how it will drive up health costs? That report was a major blow to the President's push toward socialized medicine.

The report was truthful, but the truth does not play well in Chicago politics. In Chicago, when the numbers don't work, you don't change the program, you change the numbers.

And wouldn't you know, as a guest on this morning's today show, the President mentioned that he just had a meeting with the CBO (see video).

OBAMA: And so, what we’ve got to do, is to bend the cost curve over the long term. And we’ve put forward a whole series of proposals to do that, and the Congressional Budget Office and every health care expert have looked at many of our proposals, and they’ve said, “You know, this has a good chance of working.” Not all of them have been adopted by Congress yet –

VIERA: But — not to beat a dead horse here, but again, the Congressional Budget Office is looking at those bills that are out there, and they’re saying they do not contain costs. Any one of those bills, would you sign them, based on what you see?

OBAMA: Right now, they’re not where they need to be. But I promise you, I just met with the Congressional Budget Office today, so I know exactly what they’re saying. And what they’re saying is, is that the cost savings that are in those bills right now, some of them may actually work, but they’re not enough to offset the additional costs of bringing in 46 million new people to provide.

 Why is this meeting so unusual? First of all the CBO is a legislative agency, a meeting with the President represents a loss of congressional control. More important is that it goes against the purpose of the Congressional Budget Office. One of the main goals of the CBO is to be separate from the President so it can independently re-analyze budget/program projections provide generated by the executive branch.

The President's meeting was an obvious attempt to strong-arm the CBO into producing better numbers for his pet project. Don't be surprised if the heath care numbers are better next time.  After all, we know how Chicago Politics works.

I found out about the President's meeting from Hot Air where Ed Morrissey has more on the story.  Click here to read his post.

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