Desperate men do desperate things, and those who have any doubt just how desperate the Dems are over passing health reform should read the Washington Post editorial that puts the lie to what the White House and Senate Majority Leader Reid are attempting to do — put $241 billion in new health reform spending off-budget.

Off-budget is Washington speak for lets-spend-the-money-but-not-count-that-we-are-spending-it. Taking ever so slight liberties with Senator Gregg´s recent comments, this is more bananization of our republic.

President Obama and Majority Leader Ried are lying to make their other lie about health reform not adding to the deficit a less visible lie.

It´s just like printing money, let´s all just pretend that we are not going to spend $241 billion to buy off the American Medical Association´s continued political cover for our politically failing health care reform plan. It´s easy, just declare its off-budget and it does not count.

When RedState starts quoting the Washington Post editorial board, the outrage committed by the White House and Majority Leader Reid must be so great, that even the WaPo editorial board cannot bear it:

IN THE WORLD according to Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.), setting Medicare payment levels for doctors has nothing to do with health reform. Really.… Where to start with this? First off, $247 billion — the 10-year cost of the fix — is one whopper of a “discrepancy.” Dealing with that “discrepancy” amounts to more than one-quarter of the cost of health reform. President Obama has vowed that health reform will not add a single dime to the deficit — but he is seemingly unfazed about adding more than a quarter-trillion dollars to the deficit by changing the Medicare reimbursement formula without finding a way to pay for it.

Second, Mr. Reid’s attempt to distinguish the budgetary and regulatory issues is nonsensical….
The so-called doc fix is being rushed to the Senate floor this week in advance of health reform not because it has nothing to do with health reform but because it has everything to do with it. The political imperative is twofold: to make certain that Republicans don’t use the physician payment issue to bring down the larger bill and to placate the American Medical Association.

This latest maneuver only heightens the fiscal irresponsibility of what already was a fiscal sleight of hand. The measure passed by the Senate Finance Committee patched the problem for one year, at a cost just shy of $11 billion. The argument was that the rest of the problem could be dealt with — and, at least in theory, paid for — later. Now, Mr. Reid proposes not to pay for any of it, not even $11 billion, but simply to write a $247 billion IOU.

These are costs — huge costs — that the administration would, for the most part, prefer to assume away [read: pretend]; it wants to exempt itself from the responsibility of having to come up with a way to ensure that dealing with them does not add to the deficit…..

A president who says that he is serious about dealing with the dire fiscal picture cannot credibly begin by charging this one to the national credit card, with no concern for the later generations who will have to pay the bill.

Can you see why the world is running from the U.S. dollar like it´s typhoid Mary? The U.S. government´s official fiscal policy is: let´s pretend. Let´s pretend we are not spending $241 billion. Let´s pretend we have a health reform bill with legislative language. Instead, the American public and the U.S. Senate get a vapor bill.

This sick joke is making a joke of the U.S. dollar. It is making a joke of the White House. It is making a joke of the U.S. and it is making a joke of the U.S. electorate for putting up with the let´s pretend fiscal policies of the White House and the Democratic run Congress.

But it all justified by Dems who are convinced that if the President´s health reform plan fails, greater woes will befall the Republic. They are self-centered, self-agrandizing self-destructive fools.

As one financial world wag from CITIGROUP said recently, things that can´t last, don´t.