Health-Care Bill Wouldn't Raise Deficit, Report Says

Washington Post:

Congressional budget analysts gave an important political boost Wednesday to a Senate panel's health-care overhaul, projecting that the $829 billion measure would both dramatically shrink the ranks of the uninsured and keep President Obama's pledge that doing so would not add "one dime" to federal budget deficits.

With the report from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, the measure crafted by the Senate Finance Committee has emerged as the only one of five bills drafted by various committees that achieves every important goal Obama has set for his top domestic initiative.

White House budget director Peter Orszag applauded the analysis, saying the bill "demonstrates that we can expand coverage and improve quality while being fiscally responsible," and Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) called the CBO report "another important step down the road toward enacting comprehensive health insurance reform." But senior Republicans seemed only to harden in their opposition to the measure.