From a friend on the Hill:
This Bowles-Simpson substitute — put forward by LaTourette and Cooper — is gaining some traction among moderate Rs, and if it succeeds conservatives lose.
The best argument against it is that it assumes full funding of Obamacare – the full $1.6 trillion is in there. And the material that LaTourette’s office is circulating makes clear their opposition to bipartisan premium-support reforms and their explicit embrace of Obamacare’s rationing mechanism:
“The GDP+1 limitation will not require any further changes in health care programs if the reforms in the ACA and other health reforms work as well as hoped and reduce costs more than CBO currently projects. The budget simply says that Congress will need to take further actions if those reforms fall short of limiting spending growth to GDP+1.”
In other words, LaTourette-Cooper = Obamacare.
I just wanted to draw to your attention because it would be a pretty big betrayal of conservatives (not to mention a huge strategic mistake) for Republicans to embrace a grand-bargain plan at this moment, much less a grand bargain plan that explicitly incorporates Obamacare.