90 Days Is Enough Time…

1. To complete the entire P90X workout challenge.
2. For Mercury to revolve around the Sun.
3. For a cheetah to be conceived and born.
4. For the U.S. government to add nearly $350 billion to the national debt.

 
90 Days Isn’t Enough Time…
 
For the President to submit details to Congress about his “plan” to reduce Medicare spending.  
 
In a joint letter to the President, dated April 20, 2011, Ways and Means Chairman Dave Camp (R-MI) and Energy and Commerce Chairman Fred Upton (R-MI) asked President Obama to provide information about vague suggestions he made in an April 13 speech about changing the Medicare program.  Ninety days later, the two Chairmen still have not received a response.  
 
Now, with just 12 days until August 2 – the date on which the Obama administration says the U.S. will default on its debt unless Congress and the president reach and deal to cut future spending and increase the debt limit – President Obama has yet to provide a plan.  And the two Chairmen, whose committees share jurisdiction over the Medicare program, have questions, but no answers, about how the president envisions achieving the savings he suggested.  
 
The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office can’t “estimate speeches” and “need[s] much more specificity than was provided in that speech …to do [its] analysis.”  The Ways and Means and Energy and Commerce Committees need much more specificity than this administration has provided if the President’s “proposal” is to be taken seriously – we need a plan, Mr. President.