Posted on 03/22/2010 4:02:59 PM PDT by OldDeckHand
upporters of the health care bill were ecstatic over the finding of the Congressional Budget Office, released last week, that the federal budget deficit will come in lower over the next 10 years should the bill become law. When news of the CBO forecast came in over the airwaves, invariably the reports noted that the CBO is a “nonpartisan” institution.
It’s funny that public radio and the mainstream newspapers have a reflex making them call CBO nonpartisan, because a little knowledge of the CBO’s founding and history would dispel this myth right away. The CBO began life in 1974, the year Watergate forced Richard Nixon to resign — in other words, in one of the most partisan years in American political history. The CBO owes its existence to the baldly partisan environment of that year.
The Democrats had a big majority in Congress at the time but found that Nixon had proven adept at nixing their pet spending initiatives. Nixon would “impound” funds that Congress had authorized to spend on this and that pet project, and the money would go unspent. Infuriated, the Democrats revised the entire budget process just to make it impossible for the president to proceed in this manner. With the 1974 budget “reform,” the piecemeal appropriations process of the past was scrapped. Now only two budget resolutions would be passed every year, each one accounting for large portions of the aggregate federal budget. If the president wanted to impound funds, he would have to put the whole resolution in escrow. That was unthinkable, so the Democrats were assured of every drop of their pork.
(Excerpt) Read more at rollcall.com ...
When a news report goes out of its way to label some group “nonpartisan”, that is a sure indicator that the opposite is true.
The CBO exposed itself here as so corrupt it ought to be abolished the next time Republicans are in the majority. It has no credibility after this fiasco.
You’re talking about the party that can’t even insist on semi parity in Presidential debates. Year after year we endure so called debates moderated exclusively by far left libs. If the Republicans had any kind of gumption at all, they’d insist on at least one third of the debates being hosted by conservative, or even somewhat conservative, moderators. It never happens.
Really.
I can’t believe that others can’t recognized this fact.
I may not be a genius but I knew this about 3 decades ago.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.