Like I Said, The Ever-Increasing Cost Of The Government Health Care Takeover...

I don't generally toot my own horn, but in this case I'll make an exception because, well, this week has sucked and I just want to. Please indulge me for a moment...

Just yesterday I said this:

There are supposedly 47 million uninsured in this country. Obama's bill is going to spend $1,000,000,000,000 on a plan to insure just 1/3 of them! By this math, that means the total cost to insure all 47 million would be well over $3,000,000,000,000, and if you assume that the project goes over budget by 50% (not at all uncommon, given the government's track record), that means we're actually talking about $4,500,000,000,000.

Today, we see this:

Yesterday, the CBO estimated that the current Democratic Senate health care bill would increase the defict by $1 trillion over 10 years while leaving 30 million uninsured, forcing the White House to distance itself from the legislation. While liberals have tried to emphasize that the CBO provided only a partial analysis of the draft legislation from Ted Kennedy's Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, a more comprehensive analysis of the legislation will only serve to drive the bill's ultimate cost higher. ...

Health Systems Innovations Network, a consulting group, went ahead and estimated the full cost of a bill that included the subsidies and Medicaid expansion, and reduced the number of uninsured by 99 percent. With these assumptions, they estimated (pdf) the cost at a staggering $4 trillion over 10 years...

And here's the fun part...even this estimate leaves out the cost of the inevitable tax increases! Pick up the phone and call your elected representatives.

And yes, it's cool to be immediately validated every now and then. Thus ends the horn-tooting. :)

There's my two cents.