A lesson in dishonesty

A lesson in dishonesty
By Thomas Oliphant
Boston Globe Columnist  
February 13, 2005
WASHINGTON
PRESIDENT BUSH'S latest, self-inflicted budget wound is more of a lesson in the dangers of partisanship than an example of the consequences of dishonesty.
To an extent, the White House is correct in its cynical remarks that the estimates of the real cost of the impending prescription drug benefit for retired people was low-balled at the time the system was enacted in 2003.
However, these remarks miss the most important point. The president had a choice that year, between a prescription drug benefit passed with the backing of leaders in both parties by a wide margin and one rammed down the throats of Republican lawmakers -- with the aid of cost estimates known by those who made them to be false -- and passed by the narrowest of margins.
Bush chose the latter course, and that is making all the difference....