Sorry Boehner, you don't get to overrule CBO

It's really quite egregious what the repugicans in the House are trying to do, now in their second day of running the US House. The repugicans are trying to make it so that CBO is no longer the arbiter of how much legislation costs, and whether it adds or subtracts from the deficit.

For those who don't know, the Congressional Budget Office is an independent agency of the Congress. Neither the Democrats nor the repugicans run it. It is completely independent. But the repugicans are unhappy that CBO has concluded, repeatedly, that last year's health care reform legislation will save over $100bn over the next ten years, and they're even more unhappy that CBO has just upped its numbers to $230bn for the cost of repealing HCR over the next ten years.

So, when they're confronted with incontrovertible facts, the repugicans attack the source, and lie.

Every single journalist working in Washington, DC knows about CBO. They know CBO is independent, and that CBO is what we use to "score" legislation, period. The repugicans can not be permitted to get away with removing CBO as the final arbiter of how much legislation costs. The damage to decision-making in Washington would be tremendous. The repugicans in the House literally issued their own analysis today of what they think health care reform will cost. And nobody cares. It's irrelevant what the repugicans in the House, or frankly the White House, "thinks" health care reform will save us. What matters is what independent impartial arbiters say, and that's CBO.

This is part of the larger repugican strategy to undermine any authority that contradicts their worldview - contradicts their lies. It's why the repugicans have been denigrating the mainstream media for two decades (at least). And it's why they're now suggesting we all ignore CBO. They cannot be allowed to get away with this, as ABC News's The Note did in a recent story in which they quoted the repugicans' analysis as to why CBO is wrong, but didn't get anyone from CBO to explain why they're right.

Stop playing he-said she-said, ABC (and all the rest of you in the media). And start doing your job. If you know one guy is lying, then report that fact. Your job isn't to take lies and give them the patina of truth. That's not fair and balanced, it's FAUX.