Baucus Health Bill “Riots in the Streets”

The CBO has scored the Baucus Health Bill and it comes in at a tidy $829 billion dollars … plus reducing the deficit by $81 billion dollars … all over ten years. Setting aside the afront the bill makes to your personal freedom to choose … $81 billion is chump change.

But even if that’s good enough for you, consider … it becomes deficit neutral by adding billions in taxes. Among them, the so called “mommy” tax … a tax placed on medical equipment starting at $100 (which is better than what Baucus originally proposed that would tax all medical equipment including Tampons), a tax on expensive health care plans (listening unions) and taxes on people who choose not to buy insurance.

But the biggest hit comes to seniors. The biggest cost savings will come from $500 billion in cuts to Medicare … more than $100 billion coming from the elimination of Medicare Advantage. Gulp!

Last night on Neil Cavuto’s show, Lindsey Graham said if this goes through there will be riots in the streets.

Topping it all off, it still leaves millions uninsured:

The bill would leave 25 million Americans uninsured – fully 6% of the population, excluding illegal immigrants, according to the CBO. But it would result in coverage for 29 million who currently do not have insurance, the CBO said.

So … we spend $829 billion dollars to insure 29 million people? Hmmm. Money well spent, don’t you think? Karl Rove calls it slight of hand.

Voters likely won’t react well to the price tag of Mr. Baucus’s bill. Yesterday’s Congressional Budget Office (CBO) report pegs its cost at $829 billion over the next 10 years. The CBO report claims the bill won’t add to the budget deficit until 2015—but the bill only manages that feat by delaying benefits and imposing taxes and Medicare and Medicaid cuts up front.

The battle continues.