Friday, January 26, 2007; A05

Prescription Drug Plan To Cost Less, CBO Says

The U.S. government's prescription drug plan will cost billions of dollars less than expected in the coming years, the head of the Congressional Budget Office said.

Peter R. Orszag, the newly installed director of the nonpartisan agency, said yesterday that the Medicare drug plan's 10-year cost will be $265 billion less than the agency estimated in August. The agency cut its estimate because it expects that the number of people who sign up for the plan and the cost of covering those who do will be less than projected, Orszag said.

Orszag largely attributed the reduced cost to drug plans' lower-than-anticipated bids to provide the coverage. He said the bids this year, on average, are 15 percent lower than the ones submitted last year.

He also said that the CBO cut its estimate of the percentage of Medicare beneficiaries who will ultimately sign up for the drug plan from 87 percent to 78 percent. The agency now expects that more beneficiaries will retain their existing drug coverage rather than switch to the government's program, he said.

The government began subsidizing prescription drug coverage in its Medicare program in January 2006.

The new head of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee wants to reduce energy consumption -- starting with her colleagues.

Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) is installing in her Capitol Hill office energy-efficient lights that dim in response to natural light. At her invitation, five other senators are doing the same.

The change is not going to solve the problem of global warming, but Boxer said the pilot program, overseen and funded by the Architect of the Capitol, could cut electricity consumption as much as 50 percent in participating offices.

"Don't you think it's time the federal government" serve as "a model of energy efficiency?" Boxer asked yesterday at a meeting of the U.S. Conference of Mayors, at which she described the plan.

Vice President Cheney exerted "constant" pressure on the Senate intelligence committee's previous chairman, a Republican, to stall an investigation into the Bush administration's use of flawed intelligence on Iraq, the panel's Democratic chairman charged.

In an interview with McClatchy Newspapers, Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV (W.Va.) said it was "not hearsay" that Cheney pushed Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) to drag out the investigation of the administration's use of prewar intelligence.

"It was just constant," Rockefeller said of Cheney's alleged interference. He said that he knew Cheney attended policy meetings in which he conveyed White House directions to Republican senators.

In an e-mail response, Cheney's spokeswoman, Lea Anne McBride, said: "The vice president believes Senator Roberts was a good chairman of Intelligence Committee."

Roberts's chief of staff, Jackie Cottrell, blamed the Democrats for the investigation remaining incomplete more than two years after it began. "Senator Rockefeller's allegations are patently untrue," she said in an e-mail statement.

"I'm not aware of any effort by the vice president, his staff or anyone in the administration to influence the speed at which the committee did its work," said Bill Duhnke, who was Roberts's staff director.

-- From News Services