Orszag blasts 'loosey goosey' critiques of health legislation cost containment

[babylonsister]

Orszag blasts 'loosey goosey' critiques of health legislation cost containment
By Jordan Fabian and Walter Alarkon - 11/25/09 01:50 PM ET


Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Peter Orszag on Wednesday took aim at "loosey goosey" criticisms of the Democratic healthcare bill's ability to contain costs.

Orszag, in a conference call with reporters Wednesday, contrasted suggestions that the bill will lead to more federal debt with recent reports in The Atlantic and The New York Times that found that economists who have looked closely at the bill support many of its features.

"The folks who have done that kind of reporting come to a much different conclusion instead of a kind of 'loosey goosey, let's talk about things in the air instead of what's in the legislation,'" Orszag said.

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Orszag's push back against the GOP attacks came ahead of next week's Senate debate on the healthcare bill.

Orszag touted the praise for the bill from health economists in academia, a former Congressional Budget Office director and economists who worked in President George W. Bush's administration. The health experts were all cited in recent stories by The Atlantic's Ron Brownstein and the Times' David Leonhardt.

In Brownstein's story, Jonathan Gruber, an economist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said he had been a skeptic of past health reform bills but that he found the latest Senate legislation to be the "best effort anyone has ever made" at reining in costs.

Orszag suggested that others who have questioned the bill haven't been as thorough as Brownstein. He noted that The Atlantic reporter identified specific pages of the bill while interviewing him for the piece.

"I would say to folks in the looser range, 'What specifically else would you do?'" he added.

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http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/69503-orszag-blasts-loose-goosey-critiques-of-health-bill