The House and Senate Budget Committees have published succinct rejoinders to the CBO reported we blogged on here, providing warnings about the misleading, thought favorable, short-term deficit projection against the backdrop of the long term fiscal condition of the nation. My colleague Craig commends in particular this (Page 5 of the House document (Realistic Estimate Shows Bleak Deficit Outlook), graphic depiction of the distorted long term-picture painted by the Bush Administration.

With release of CBO's latest budget projection comes the latest edition of Tales from the OMB. OMB Director Rob Portman released this statement regarding CBO's projection of coming surpluses (more on that later, but I want to debunk this bit that really sticks in my craw): Two years ago the President laid out an ambitious goal to cut the deficit in half by 2009, and we met that goal three years early. This is, of course, remarkably similar to this week's episode of Presidential Budget Story Time, as encapsulated by this line in the president's SOTU speech:

The Senate appears less eager than the House did to pass the minimum wage hike. Its deliberations on S.2, the Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007, continued after this afternoon's votes on numerous amendments and a cloture vote. Two things are now clear:

Peter Orszag has been officially appointed to direct the Congressional Budget Office (CB0). See this press release for more.