a $200 billion screw in congress
the john-john team got a freebie today…
Fiscal drug abuse [cincinnati post, july 8, 2004]An internal investigation has confirmed that the Department of Health and Human Services threatened to fire Medicare’s chief actuary if he told Congress that the estimated cost of the prescription drug bill was far higher than the White House was letting on.
The probe said no criminal laws were broken, that Medicare’s then-chief official Thomas Scully was within management rights in withholding the information and threatening to discipline chief actuary Richard Foster if he released it to Congress.
we’re going to point to this as yet another example of “just because it’s legal, doesn’t mean it’s right.”
and it can only get more interesting…
Fiscal drug abuse [cincinnati post, july 8, 2004]Although HHS Secretary Tommy Thompson promised to release all the documents relevant to the incident, his department is withholding 149 pages out of the 162 pages requested and the Democrats and the Associated Press are suing to get them.
more from the new york times [registration] and washington post [registration] yesterday.
i guess this also opens up a front on the right of the administration, for those republicans who still believe in small government and fiscal responsibility.
