(cross posted at freeforall)
Jonathan Bernstein with a post decrying the poor job the WaPo Ombudsman did in describing the controversy around the piece put out last week by Charles Blahous that said the ACA will increase the deficit (contro to CBO’s longstanding estimates). I was with my family in a car heading South on I-95 reading about the unfolding controversy on twitter last week, and so I didn’t post on it. However, even now, it is mostly being described as a dust up over double counting (how can something help the deficit and Medicare). Jonathan Chait has a good piece debunking this claim, Kevin Drum has a nice illustration of why this is not a valid claim, and Josh Barro adds a bit more on how this interpretation undermines one of the conservative charges leveled against the President. This is an old argument, rehashed.