Must Reads: CBO Explains Its Own Obamacare Report as Admin Delays Another Mandate

Every a.m., Mediaite publishes a primer of what the interweb machine is writing, talking, tweeting, and blogging about, so that you may fool friends and family into thinking you are a trove of information and insight. Today: the Congressional Budget Office explains that little report they released last week, another mandate delay could be the last straw for Obamacare, Bill Keller leans to love the internet, and more.

“Frequently Asked Questions About CBO’s Estimates of the Labor Market Effects of the Affordable Care Act” (Doug Elmendorf, CBO)

The CBO released a FAQ this morning on its Report Heard Round the World. Elmendorf’s explainer is clear, concise and thorough, and should be read in its entirety, but if you need the tl;dr version, here it is:

Q: Will 2.5 Million People Lose Their Jobs in 2024 Because of the ACA?
A: No, we would not describe our estimates in that way.

“CBO Speaks Up” (Paul Krugman, New York Times)

The always-pithy Krugman would add one question to that FAQ:

Q: Will our saying this stop pundits from misrepresenting what we said?
A: No.

“Why I’m Getting Sick of Defending Obamacare” (Ron Fournier, National Journal)

Fournier has a balanced, well-reasoned critique of the seemingly endless drip of delays of Affordable Care Act implementation, the most recent of which delays the employer mandate for medium-sized businesses (50-99 workers) another year. His objection is less on the legal terms of the delays and more on their enervation to the law itself:

Advocates for a strong executive branch, including me, have given the White House a pass on its rule-making authority, because implementing such a complicated law requires flexibility. But the law may be getting stretched to the point of breaking.

[snip] I want the ACA to work because I want health insurance provided to the millions without it, for both the moral and economic benefits. I want the ACA to work because, as Charles Lane wrote for the Washington Post, the link between work and insurance needs to be broken. I want the ACA to work because the GOP has not offered a serious alternative that can pass Congress.

Unfortunately, the president and his team are making their good intentions almost indefensible.

“Rieder: Keller’s Surprise Move to Digital Start-Up” (Rem Rieder, USA Today)

Rieder asks the question that must have been on everyone’s mind following former New York Times’ executive editor Bill Keller’s announcement he was leaving the Gray Lady for a digital startup: namely, how does a guy who’s been vocally skeptical of journalism’s interaction with the internet (Keller’s no fan of online aggregation or Twitter) go about running a digital site?

Rieder only skims the surface, but one hopes more will be written in this vein.

“Here’s the First Recorded Instance of the F-word in English” (Katherine Trendacosta, io9)

This day in trivia.

[Image via REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst]

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This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.