The Importance of Congressional Budgeting

It's sobering that 58 percent of American voters support the repeal of Obamacare just three weeks after Congress passed it, and that's probably without even realizing the extent of the tainted cost estimates from the Congressional Budget Office or the tax consequences of the bill. If accurate accounting and the actual tax consequences were to be fully publicized, this nightmare would be even less popular.

It's important to note the culprits in this horrific process are Congressional Democrats, not the CBO. The CBO does good and admirable work, and their charter stipulates what rules they must operate under. A proposed "solution" to the Democrats' gaming problem, allowing the CBO to make judgment calls on the effectiveness or likelihood of aspects of legislation, is worse than the disease.

The solution to the problem of gaming the CBO is to re-take Congress for the GOP and stop gaming the process. I'm not confident that the GOP will be able to restrain themselves from partaking in similarly egregious gaming.

But, again, the CBO is not the problem. The Democrats are.