According to a new report released today by Citizens for Tax Justice (CTJ), the tax cuts passed under President George W. Bush, which provide benefits mostly to the rich, will cost the country $2.5 trillion over the decade after they were first enacted (2001-2010). A number of lawmakers who voted for the Bush tax cuts have recently been arguing against health care reform legislation aimed at helping all Americans, claiming reforms are "too costly." How can this be?

In its report, CTJ points out that the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has recently projected health care reform legislation to cost $1 trillion over the decade after it is first enacted (2010-2019). With the Bush tax cuts costing two and a half times as much as proposed deficit-neutral health care reform legislation, and providing nowhere near the benefit of the later, it is obvious "that health care reform," to some lawmakers, "is not a matter of costs, but a matter of priorities."

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