HEALTH CARE ROUND UP

The Worst Bill Ever? ... the House disguises hundreds of billions of dollars in additional costs with budget gimmicks. It "pays for" about six years of program with a decade of revenue, with the heaviest costs concentrated in the second five years. The House also pretends Medicare payments to doctors will be cut by 21.5% next year and deeper after that, "saving" about $250 billion. ObamaCare will be lucky to cost under $2 trillion over 10 years; it will grow more after that. ... This surtax could hit ever more earners because, like the alternative minimum tax, it isn't indexed for inflation. Yet it still won't be nearly enough. Even if Congress had confiscated 100% of the taxable income of people earning over $500,000 in the boom year of 2006, it would have only raised $1.3 trillion. When Democrats end up soaking the middle class, perhaps via the European-style value-added tax that Mrs. Pelosi has endorsed, they'll claim the deficits that they created made them do it. The Wall Street Journal

Surtax, Indexing, We’ve Been Down This Road Before. The AMT was never indexed for inflation, so Congress must enact a fix each year to spare about 25 million middle-income families from being hit with big tax increases. "They're going down the same road by not indexing this tax," said the Republican lawmaker Camp. The Associated Press

Lieberman: Doing Nothing Is Better Than A Public Option. "The truth is that nothing is better than that (a public option) because I think we ought to follow, if I may, the doctors' oath here in Congress as we deal with health care reform: Do no harm," Lieberman said. The Washington Post

Broken Promise Watch: Senate Dems “Cadillac Tax” Breaks Presidential Promise. Senior White House Counsel Valerie Jarrett told me this morning that the President will keep to his pledge not to tax the middle class to pass his health care package. “He’s confident that a bill will be passed consistent with his parameters.” According to Republican Senator Charles Grassley, the Joint Tax Committee’s analysis shows taxes will go up for 46 million Americans making under $250,000 under the plan. ABC News

The Republican Alternative, An Incremental Approach. Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives plan to offer an alternative to Democrats' massive healthcare reform bill that would not raise taxes or require people or businesses to buy health insurance, the House Republican leader said on Sunday. … John Boehner, the House's top Republican, said his party hoped to introduce one single bill with a "step-by-step approach" that would include allowing the purchase of health insurance across state lines, letting people group together to buy it at lower prices and ending "junk lawsuits." Reuters

ECONOMY: The Administration Waivers On Its Messaging As The Stimulus Fails To Produce Desired Results And A Jobless Recovery Continues.

Administration’s Stimulus Message … Then and Now: Confused about President Obama's stimulus package? The administration may not be the place to find clarity. The White House leadership has made statements about the stimulus that often are inconsistent -- and at odds with facts put out by the administration. The Los Angeles Times

Stimulus Failing To Help Manufacturing. The manufacturing industry has shed hundreds of thousands of jobs during the recession as plants have closed or scaled back. … Nationwide, only 2,500 of the 640,000 stimulus jobs announced Friday were in the manufacturing industry, and many of those appear to be mislabeled. The Associated Press

Lazear: Stimulus Job Numbers Are Unreliable. Unfortunately, these data are not reliable indicators of job creation nor of the even vaguer notion of job retention. There are two major problems. The first and most obvious is reporting bias. Recipients have strong incentives to inflate their reported numbers. In a race for federal dollars, contractors may assume that the programs that show the most job creation may be favored by the government when it allocates additional stimulus funds. No dishonesty on the part of recipients is implied or required. But when a hire conceivably can be classified as resulting from the stimulus money, recipients have every incentive to classify the hire as such. Classification as stimulus-induced is even more likely if a respondent must only say that, except for the money, an employee would have been fired. In this case, no hiring need occur at all. The Wall Street Journal

Credit Crunch: Banks Still Not Lending To Small Business … Loan numbers typically drop during a recession because business demand is lower and banks become more conservative, especially when dealing with struggling companies whose credit has eroded. But the 7(a) program is specifically aimed at encouraging banks to take modest risks on credit-worthy businesses whose net worth is under $8.5 million, and in February it received $730 million in stimulus money to do just that. … “I don’t quite understand it. All these [federal] dollars that are being given to these banks. It seems like everybody is getting dollars these days.’’ The Boston Globe

AFGHANISTAN: With The Election Resolved, When Will The Administration Make A Decision On Troop Levels?

Election Settled As The Administration Continues To Delay On Troop Levels. Advisers to President Obama called Mr. Abdullah’s decision a personal choice that would not greatly affect American policy and was in line with the Afghan Constitution. They portrayed the election of Mr. Karzai as essentially settled enough that Mr. Obama could move forward with deciding whether to send as many as 40,000 additional troops to Afghanistan, with an announcement that probably remains at least three weeks away. The New York Times

Further Delay On Troop Levels In Afghanistan Seems Questionable. White House officials have debated whether to make the final decision on troop levels before or after the Afghan voting. If the election does not go forward, reasons for further delay might seem questionable. The Los Angeles Times

IN OTHER NEWS

• Draining The Swamp? Bad News For Democrats In Revelation Of Ethics Probes
• Samuelson: Could America Go Broke?
• Bloomberg: Ford’s Future Looks Profitable
• Trick Or Treat: House Health Plan Rises From Slab, And It's A Monster
• Rep. Stupak: Add Abortion Restrictions
• Democrats' Quiet Changes Pile Up

THE SCHEDULE

• The House will meet at 12:30 p.m. for morning hour and 2:00 p.m. for legislative business.
• The Senate will convene at 2:00 p.m. and begin a period of morning business. Thereafter, resume consideration of H.R.3548, the Unemployment Compensation Extension Act of 2009.