McConnell on the Vote Last Night - Kathryn Jean Lopez - The Corner on National Review Online
This is one of the most expensive pieces of legislation Congress has ever approved. Including interest, as I’ve said, it’s expected to cost $1.1 trillion. To put that figure in perspective, consider this: if you spent $1 million a day, every day since Jesus was born, you still wouldn’t have spent $1 trillion. This is an extraordinary sum of money. It deserves an extraordinary level of scrutiny.
…This isn’t Monopoly money. It’s real. It adds up — and it has to be paid back, by our children and by their children.
I’d be more inclined to take McConnell seriously, but for the following:
Mitch McConnell on Health Care
Voted YES on $40 billion per year for limited Medicare prescription drug benefit.
S. 1 As Amended; Prescription Drug and Medicare Improvement Act of 2003. Vote to pass a bill that would authorize $400 billion over 10 years to create a prescription drug benefit for Medicare recipients beginning in 2006.
And…
Medicare Drug Benefit May Cost $1.2 Trillion (washingtonpost.com)
The White House released budget figures yesterday indicating that the new Medicare prescription drug benefit will cost more than $1.2 trillion in the coming decade, a much higher price tag than President Bush suggested when he narrowly won passage of the law in late 2003.
So, you’re right, McConnell - 1.1 trillion is a lot of money. Almost as much, in fact, as the 1.2 trillion boondoggle you voted for only six years ago.
Submit to Stumbled Upon!
In fairness to McConnell, you’re comparing the initial expected cost of the stimulus with the revised projected cost of the Medicare prescription drug benefit. Once a few years have passed I’m sure the actual cost of the stimulus will be much higher that $1.1 trillion.
That said, McConnell is still a hypocrite on spending issues.
Kyle, at the time of passage, many referred to it as the “trillion dollar prescription drug entitlement.” Everybody knew those initial numbers were jiggered.
Here’s what I posted in February of 2004, just a few months after the Prescription Drug Entitlement was passed:
Daily Pundit » Bush Lied - The Budget Died