Bush Kids Health Plan Veto, Republican Kool Aid And Children
Several years ago, when Hillary Clinton wrote a book suggesting it “takes a village” to raise a child, it was derided in some quarters as reaching a conclusion that it was not a certainty.
But here is one certainty:
It takes some financially well-off, pampered politicians who themselves receive government health insurance to sour — or perhaps if the illnesses are grave even end -- a kid’s childhood because they seek to make political statements, pursue personal ideological jihads, or try to position themselves or their political party.
Their supporters will angrily deny it, but these politicians are not viewing children as physically and emotionally fragile and impressionable members of our society who deserve our utmost protection and nurturing and our highest lets-pull-out-all-stops priority.
Several other conclusions can be made about President George Bush’s decision to give half a peace sign to MORE THAN 70 PERCENT of the American public that support the health care bill he vetoed — and the half a peace sign he has even now given to members of his own party who sincerely wanted it and will now likely face the wrath of voters at the polls:
1. The only people who will still use the phrase “compassionate conservatism” to describe this administration now will be his most loyal supporters or talk show hosts. Just watch the Bush — and most likely the GOP — drop in the polls now. The once-highly coveted soccer moms are unlikely to be most concerned about the dangerous peril of Americans using government health care, as Mr. Bush suggested and most likely be outraged by the veto. Some of those soccer moms may have kids who could have used or do use that program. How many Americans, over dinner, complain about the perils of government health care? How many Americans, over dinner, complain about high health care costs or their inability to afford it?
2. When the history of the Bush administration is written, historians won’t refer to Bush as “The Children’s President” — and, although kids don’t vote, it’s likely the GOP will face a lot of angry adults at the polls….since kids have have parents, uncles, and cousins…and caring doctors who may have to turn away sick kids since there is no coverage and there could have been.
3. The veto and the probability that there will be enough GOPers to prevent an override in Congress again underscores the factional nature of this Bush administration. It is an administration that clings to power due to a relatively small group of supporters and no longer reflects a political movement or a government mass support. Bush has a solid-core of backers who will back him on anything –even if it means drinking political Kool Aid that will hurt their increasingly unpopular party’s long and short term interests.
4. Bush has turned over a new political leaf. Suddenly — when it comes to children — he is the fiscally-responsible president.
Just how big a body blow has Bush delivered to his own party?
Conservative columnist Robert Novak writes in his most recent report:
Democrats have expertly used this debate to put the White House on the defensive, rally their base and cultivate expanded support. Whether this skirmish will be relevant in a year, and whether Republicans can fight back, is still up in the air.
But Novak doesn’t sound too optimistic for his party:
… Democrats, however, have very effectively cast the debate over the bill as one over insuring children or not. Mainstream media outlets repeat the Democratic framing, and very few Republicans are able to fight back effectively.
President Bush on Wednesday vetoed the reauthorization bill that would expand the program. The White House argues that the expansion is a step towards “government-run healthcare.” This objection comes across as a vague and weak one in the face of Democratic cries that a veto will leave sick “kids” without doctors. Only a few congressional Republicans are making the more straightforward objection that SCHIP is welfare, and government shouldn’t be giving welfare to people who aren’t poor. The White House’s lack of a real compass on limited government is hurting it here politically.
Novak notes that Democrats are looking forward to targeting vulnerable Republicans by “running ads in their districts calling on them to override the veto.” He then writes:
The debate is a good opportunity for Democrats to rally their strongest base of activists: labor unions. The Service Employees International Union (SEIU) dispatched dozens of children to the White House in a protest Monday.
Expanding SCHIP also endears Democrats to governors of both parties, happy to have a bigger federal pipeline of cash, and to the insurance industry, typically a GOP ally but eager to garner more subsidies under a broader SCHIP.
The avalanche of news stories on this are largely catastrophic for the image of a President who will very soon have to work hard to achieve the popularity of Richard Nixon at Nixon’s lowest point. Here are a few:
–Families Brace for SCHIP Demise
–Americans React With Anger to Bush’s Children’s Health Care Veto
–Bush Veto Gives Democrats Legislative Defeat, Political Opening
–Bush’s veto of children’s health plan puts state in bind (Massachusetts)
–Lawmakers decry veto of kids’ health bill (Maine)
And there are others.
But Bush has had his supporters. Senator John McCain applauded the move. And some argue Bush is getting a raw deal, being demonized by a biased press.
Is he?
Some reports over the past few weeks have suggested Bush would veto it on principle. One hinted it was due to the anti-tobacco provision. Yet another one suggested it was a way to set up the 2008 argument that Bush and the more loyal Republicans were battling a do-nothing Congress and preventing it from going wild on spending.
But FEW reports have indicated Bush’s genuine, heartfelt concern about flesh and blood children.
And that underlying conclusion may be what is the back of much of the sheer anger over the veto.
Childhood is always fragile and the world is so much more perilous in 2007. Health insurance rates are sky high. And when an issue that enjoys WIDESPREAD SUPPORT among the American public and some support within his own party comes up, Bush vetoes it – citing as a prime reason his philosophical differences.
If most non-Rush Limbaugh and non-lockstep-Bush-defending Americans look at this, they will likely strip it away and conclude:
He doesn’t really seem to care about the childhoods and health of these children. His supporters are furious if that statement is EVER made and go after anyone who dares make that statement (you will probably see happen now in our comments section as well) — but that is the crux of Bush and the GOP’s perception problem on this issue.
Most Americans (the 70 percent) will view Bush’s veto as him giving priority to making a statement and preserving an inadequate and dangerous status quo (and in some states remove it). His veto also shows once again that Bush doesn’t care what Americans, Democrats, independents and even some Republicans want. Repeatedly, defiance of majority opinion in a democracy seems to be considered by Bush to be a public official’s highest virtue — and in this case it’s likely to cost his party.
That party line [against the health plan], of course, is coming straight from the top, and many observers think it will come back to haunt the entire G.O.P. a year from now. While the bill passed both chambers of Congress with relatively strong bipartisan support, it failed to get enough votes in the House to override President Bush’s veto, which he issued Wednesday morning. Bush insists the expanded program, by raising the income eligibility levels, would draw children away from private insurance plans and act as a first step toward socialized medicine.
But Democrats know that ideological debates are no match for pictures of sick children, and they are already training their sights on eight vulnerable Republicans… who voted against it. “It is a defining vote; it says a lot about people’s values and priorities,” said Representative Chris Van Hollen, a Maryland Democrat and head of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
Even WORSE for the GOP: the Democrats will continue to vote on this bill to underscore the difference between what they (and the vast majority of Americans) want, and what Bush (allowed to stop it with his hardcore loyalist supporters) wants:
The Democrats’ priorities in this instance are abundantly clear — they intend on making as much political hay of the children’s health care veto as they can, whether or not they can eventually turn enough Republicans to override it. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has insisted he will continue to send the bill back to Bush’s desk without modifying it for wavering Republicans, though House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has left the door open for changes. If the President vetoes the bill a hundred times between now and the 2008 elections the Democrats can portray the G.O.P. as voting against sick poor kids. If the G.O.P. caves, they can declare themselves the champions of children’s health care and finally have a legislative accomplishment to boast about. Either way, they think they can’t lose. “It’s our hope that these members of Congress, when they hear from their constituents, that they’ll choose children’s health,” Van Hollen said. “If not, voters will hold them accountable.”
According to Time, the Democrats are planning ads against GOPers who voted against the plan.
But Republicans won’t sit back and take it but will counter attack, note that this was a program created by a Republican Congress and argue like Bush that this is an attempt to ease in government health care.
Time’s most telling quote comes from a Democrat running against one of the Republicans who voted against it who says:
“It is rapidly overcoming Iraq and here’s why: people have a hard time finding a solution on Iraq, they just can’t. This has a solution — this bill makes sense, it is clear and evident.”
And, indeed, you don’t have to be a political scientist to predict that, if this issue remains as it is on Election Day. some Republicans who voted against the plan arguing it was a perilous step on the way to government health care will feel sick as they realize they have to send resumes out for their post-Washington work lives.
But if they feel sick, they can always go to the doctor.
After all, they’re still covered under their government health care plans…
Read TMV’s earlier post about the veto pushback HERE.
42 Responses to “Bush Kids Health Plan Veto, Republican Kool Aid And Children”
Of course, when the Democratic Party is the one party left in the U.S. they can pass out all of the “free” stuff that they want. All it will take is for more than 50% of the people in a poll to say, ” I want a free pony” and the second Clinton administration will just passing out free ponies.
The Bush Administration is demonstrating its incompetence because it supported pork barrel and increased entitlement spending in the past. Thus, it has not credibility on the issue. In addition, if the polling question was ” Are you willing to pay higher taxes so that the government can increase welfare spending on the middle class?”, I would guess that less than 70% of the people would be for it.
The era of massive government is back and with a vengeance. The incompetence of the Bush Adminstration has been seen that only supporters of increasing government spending will have a seat at the table when policy is made.
The irony is that the Bush Administration is a “supporter of increasing government spending.”
This is part of GWOT- George’s War On Toddlers- seriously tho the Dems have picked up the ball- following the old rule Frame the issue, then Claim the issue.
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“The era of massive government is back and with a vengeance.”
That era has been back for some time now with Bush in charge in case you didn’t notice. And if this is the type of things the GOP base gets outraged at, insuring poor kids, no wonder the Democrats are going to be “the one party left in the US”. The only difference between this handout and the ones Bush has been doing is that this one goes to people that really need it, and in some cases won’t live without it.
Why is it the remaining 30%, or whatever it is now, of Bush supporters have no problem with Bush pissing away hundreds of billions on wars, tax breaks for the most economically secure and corporations making record profits, yet cry foul when that money goes to people that don’t have access essential services?
There are millions of kids without insurance, come up with another plan for a family of 4 making $30-40k/year to cover their kids and I’m sure you’ll be heard. On that kind of money, which is near the median, you’ll be living in a rathole and not saving a penny.
Joe:
I cannot speak to President Bush’s motivations, whether personal or political, but I can say one thing: I oppose the federal SCHIP expansion for a number of reasons.
My top object, I am afraid, is rhetorical rather than substantive. The Democrats here are attempting to enact a policy by making an end run around voters’ common sense. The Democratic argument on this issue has little to do with the wisdom of expanding a federal program, the implications of that expansion, or even the finances of it.
Rather, Democrats have quite literally deployed small children in this political fight in an attempt to short-circuit reasoned debate.
“But the budget … ”
“You hate children!”
“There is a significant problem with crowd-out … ”
“You want children to die!”
“Shouldn’t this best be left to the states?”
“You want this child, right here, to die of cancer!”
It is an ignoble debate tactic, and one that I strongly oppose. It’s an attempt to bypass my common sense and appeal to my reptile-like base desire to protect small children.
I find this argument unpersuasive when used to restrict free speech, and I find the argument unpersuasive here.
As to other, more substantive arguments:
How is this expansion financed? The Democrats’ plan calls for a hefty tobacco tax to finance expansion of the program by $35 billion over five years. This is unwise. Thanks to public-health campaigns, smoking has decreased in the United States over the last several decades, and it will probably continue to decrease. Additionally, state and local anti-smoking ordinances — including a proposal in California to ban all smoking inside apartment buidings — will likely reduce this further. Not to mention the inevitable decrease in cigarette purchases once the new tax is implemented.
Another problem with entitlement programs in general is that once you set them up, they almost never go away. They turn into regulatory Freddy Kruegers returning again and again despite any attempts to kill them (holy water, stakes through the heart, dismemberment) should they become unaffordable or no longer serve the populations they are meant to assist.
Is eligibility proper under the expansion? As I understand it, states will be able to apply for matching funds to cover children earning up to three times the federal poverty level, although states, as I understand it, could apply for waivers to go higher. I am unsure that this is the best strategy. Even those states in which three times the federal poverty level does not constitute a distressed condition will have incentives to expand SCHIP coverage to that level under this program. Another mechanism may be needed.
How does this address the problem of seniors? On the other end of the scale, the retiring Baby Boomers are going to add a huge strain to the federal budget as they move into Medicare and Medicaid. Can they be covered at the same time SCHIP is expanded?
Finally, and more broadly, there is the overall question of health-care reform. Issues that Joe cites above, including insurance costs and the costs of medical care, are much broader than mere SCHIP expansion. If they are to be addressed in any meaningful way, the debate needs to come in the context of the entire system, not in a piecemeal fashion. Expanding SCHIP is a prime example of that piecemeal approach.
I am all for a debate on health-care reform. The current debate includes a variety of ideas from total free-market approaches to total single-payer proposals. We need to have that debate honestly and logically, not piecemeal, and certainly without the accusation that one side or the other hates children.
–|PW|–
This is the part whete my blood pressure goes up when I think about pro-lifers.
The push is to have every potential child become an actual child. But as soon as that happens, the mother and family are on their own to provide,, regardless of circumstances. Then we switch over to personal responsibility and the evils of big govenrment.
There’s an empty slogan for every political occasion.
Actually doing something to address a problem doesn’t figure into the calculations of these folks.
Penny-
You make so many generalizations and assertion along with the valid questions you pose, that it’s possible to respond in only a selective way.
1. So you’ve discovered the rhetoric of activism.
Rather than counter with dramatizations of the rhetoric from the other side in order to circumvent open debate, I’ll just move on.
2. As for needed mechanisms to control expanding into inappropriatly high income levels, those are already present in amendments to the bill.
3. This does not address the problem of seniors.
Neither does this address other stresses on the budget, like the wars in Iraq and Afghanitstan.
One way to attack our overall budgetary problems is to invest in having a healthy populace, with people who can contribute to the exomony instead of being a drain on it. We need healthy children, as many as possible, for the sake of the nation. including our semoprs/
4. Welfare programs, before they were renamed ‘entitlement programs’ as part of political jingoism, are the glue that keeps a society together. Rather than bemoaning how hard it is to get rid of them, we should be looking at ways to help people out of needing them. indefinitely. The goal should be roataion in recipients, not the eliminaiton of recitpients..
5. Planning reform should include all tools available.
Relying strictly on market forces, however, is exactly what has led to the current crisis in medical insurance affordability. Market forces have failed.
Market forces, on thieir own, do not solve all problems. At the very least, they need guidance and oversight when it comes to questions of the public good.
6. To solve any poblem requires investment. Cuttong costs today is a temporary band-aid, not a solution. The goal should be to invest reasonbly in our future so as to enable major savings in the future. Investing in people, in theri health and education, is the soundest of all investments.
7. Of course, we have to debate all these issues.
O course we have to be caresul about how we finance new proposals. But what we don;t need is debate that amounts to a delaying tactic to kick the prolem down the road to the next generation. Paoblems don’t solve themselves. They just fester and get bigger. Healthcare and health insurance problems have been festering too long already
.
Let’s not forget that its the S-chip, S for State. There is nothing stopping the states from providing coverage to the families in need – as it should be.
Publius anyone?
Emotion rather than reason, with a lot of dishonesty as well. This never was about poor children.
Too many people have contempt for federalism. After all, to them, Washington is bigger and better, and promises bigger, better benefits.
In addition, there is an additional behavior by the Bush administration that refines criticism of him (real criticism, not the garbage we’re currently seeing).
A fundamental defect of the program’s expansion is that its scope includes adults as well as households well above the poverty level. (Spitzer in New York is attempting to let families qualify at 400% of the poverty level.) The higher you go the more likely there is to be “crowd-out,” where people forego private insurance they already have for publicly subsidized insurance (adding to the costs of the program).
The fine point here regarding Bush’s sudden discovery of fiscal prudence is that his administration has granted waivers to the states several times in the past to let adults as well as children benefit from S-CHIP. (This was presumably done to reduce the costs of other welfare programs.) Bush cannot claim with a straight face that the expansion is wrong because adults as well as children qualify for the program. His only arguments now are with the qualification level in some states being too high (more crowd-out among higher-income people means at least some lower-income people will not be able to be assisted, and this program was meant to help the poor get health insurance for their children), as well as other details such as the regressivity and false hope underpinning the tobacco tax (its unreliability as a stable or growing revenue source already addressed by another poster).
Discussions about the FPL need to be completely reframed. Current poverty level equations take no account of health care needs. Its as if they are just taken out of the equation. Good health care is a fundamental need for all people, not just the wealthy.
As for Bush’s explanation for vetoing the bill, its was some of the lamest horsesh*t I have ever heard him spout. At least when he talked about WMD in Iraq, you could believe that he actually believed what he was saying.
I noticed the Englehart cartoon that was posted on this Web site, depicting Bush using a Tazer on a child. As I said, the dishonest and scummy attacks on Bush will probably get worse through the end of this week and into next week. (This isn’t the first bad cartoon by him. And regarding that cartoon, the idiotic loser that really was Tazered got no sympathy except among anti-authority children; the cartoon is a real bust.)
Just like cancer.
And just like cancer, entitlement programs have no contact inhibition. They quickly grow up to their maximum budget and then find ways to keep growing.
Of course, part of the plan for S-CHIP is to have it grow out of control for than more of the middle class can get used to the free money. And also, like entitlements, when the economy is going good, they find new ways to spend money nstead of cutting back.
SD and DLS don’t seem to understand the purpose of taxes. We all pay into the system and then the system is supposed to benefit us. It’s how we get things like roads and schools. Is a public education an entitlement? Is it like “free money” for the middle class?
What about grants to pharmaceutical companies to help create new drugs and treatments? Should we end that “free money” too? I want to see you argue otherwise with a straight face.
Making funding mandatory by law is incomplete (the funds have to come from somewhere), but is the easiest way. Make it mandatory. Poof! Problem solved.
Side note: What do you think of HR 676′s accounting?
Again you’re wrong (you’re not good at mind reading any more than describing outward behavior these days). The real issue, though, comes close to what you have written here. The real issue (other than the harm that taxes and regulation do) is whether we really benefit or not from the spending. Roads and schools are great, but a host of problems have arisen from welfare programs, for example, and the results of government spending and programs are frequently not what was sought, and the nature and size of the programs are different than what was argued originally.
Actually, the definition of poverty is a subject of study in its own right, though all too often it is clouded by confusion of poverty and inequality.
We’d be much better off simply to give everyone “free money” in the form of a negative income tax or (better) equal-amount (the poverty level) guaranteed minimum income and scrap all the programs and bureaucracies. Giving everyone the same amount would satisfy sane radical egalitarians and the mechanism for this would of course be taxation of income and possibly wealth, which many on the Left want to be used for redistribution rather than merely to raise revenue.
DLS,
I’m down for that idea. It would allow your markets to do their work, and then people could only blame themselves for not having healthcare.
If that’s their only income, I believe there would still be a problem. So would the need for expensive surgery or “repairs” after an automobile or airplane crash. But so far as subsistence is concerned, it would certainly be better than what we have. (The danger with a minimum “subsistence” guaranteed income, a flat amount provided to everybody, would be that “dignity” [rather than envy] would be the professed basis for defining subsistence or “need” in a generous manner, much more generous than necessary.
More government provision of (not merely intervention in, i.e., regulating) health care in the USA is inevitable, I believe. I just wish people would not view it as a miracle and realize we’d be facing new problems even if we solved some of the old. And the costs are already a problem — already we are seeing long-term freezes and actual reductions in payments for services (one reason why doctors, while this is still a free country in such manners, are frequently refusing to serve participants in public programs), reduction in approvals of medicines such as erythropoetin (albeit in this case it may be overused), and so on. This is before providing care publicly to everyone and before the Baby Boomers get older.
Once again DLS claims that the program as passed will cover adults, which is patently false since that part was changed in conference committee.
It never ceases to amaze me, how successful the administration and its right-wing allies are at disseminating false information when it supports their position. DLS is typical of so many conservatives who are presenting their talking points- points that aren’t contained in the actual legislation, but that might sway public opinion in their direction. Without misinforming the public, its doubtful that they could garner enough support to fend off a congressional override.
[...] favorite line on this is from ‘The Moderate Voice‘: And, indeed, you don’t have to be a political scientist to predict that, if this issue [...]
Do you know the history of this program?
First of all, you’re rushing to an invalid conclusion (maybe because you’re upset). I am not a “right-wing ally of the Bush administration” merely because I supported the veto decision.
Second, “adults” includes not only childless adults (the most notorious group of beneficiaries), but parents as well as pregnant women, who are being added to, not removed from, S-CHIP. This bill does not promptly remove all adult beneficiaries from S-CHIP:
In addition, the bill does something else, besides implementing taxes on tobacco, that would naturally be asking for a veto. It overrules the rules issued by the Bush administration on S-CHIP that had addressed the income-level crowd-out problems (requirements that would effectively prohibit extension of coverage above 250 per cent of the poverty level; a one-year waiting period to discourage replacing private insurance with S-CHIP subsidized insurance). These are the rules a few states are suing to have overturned, rules that this bill would override:
Naturally Bush would be motivated to veto an override of rules his administration issued to constrain the scope of the program and reduce crowd-out (and raises the low-income limit from 250 to 300 per cent).
It helps to know what the current program is and what is in the bill. Do you know?
This “false” falsehood is getting annoying, not merely tiresome.
Pregnant women are not children. Parents (typically) are not children.
DLS has convinced me like no one else.
Because of tireless efforts to undermine a much needed measure, I would support this bill now even if I knew it was the worst bill in the history of mankind.. Anything to oppose that kind of near-sighted, thinking.
Unlike DLS, I actually read what he linked to. Notice that what he quotes are only the summary descriptions of sections of the law. What the actual text consists of is setting rules for transition periods and the next few fiscal years for those states that already have been granted waivers from the federal government while banning any new waivers that would allow for coverage of adults. Go ahead, follow his links. But don’t stop at the section he quoted. From his first link:
Wow. So they tried to not hose people who are already being helped because of waivers their state applied for too much. How evil of them.
The second link is the one that if you scroll on down past the section that DLS quoted you’ll find the whole text of the bill. It’s lengthy and full of legalese but it is understandable if you can work your way through it.
DLS- I didn’t mean that you were a right-wing ally- I know you don’t like a lot of the things the Bush administration has done. What I meant was that the talking points fit your ideology and you believe them. Sorry for the confusion. It just seems like every issue gets clouded over by misinformation campaigns that support the Bush position. (I’m not saying that the left never does this- just that everyone besides Bush and his allies seem to have reached a consensus- he seems to understand PR better than the ultimate consequences of his decisions)
Obviously. I provided the section numbers as a convenience. Just search the text for the desired section number to jump to it quickly. The bill itself was shown in case you were ready to claim the speaker as well as I was lying. I wasn’t, of course.
Interestingly, what is proposed to combat crowd-out begins with…not action, like the Bush administration’s new rules, but studies:
permitting a delay well past the 2008 elections until anything real is actually considered and done. And yes, the low-income definition limit is raised from 250 to 300 per cent of the federal poverty level or “line” as is the word used in the text. And I haven’t yet mentioned the additional employer-insurance subsidy in section 301. But it’s there if you care to look.) Adults are covered by this program and in fact are added to the program (pregnant women may be added).
“As in the past, I was wrong again, DLS. I’m sorry.”
1. Thank you.
2. The thing to do here probably is just to look at the bill itself. It does continue to cover some adults; in fact it adds new adults to the system (probably because pregnancy is associated with children); it’s basically adding pregnant women (and their children, later), freezing and trying to phase out parents (though with a separate grant nobody is, or should be, fooled), and cutting off childless adults. (I speculate that this was the result of some of the bargaining among the Democrats and Republicans.) The raising of the poverty level that defines low-income qualifications from 250 per cent in the Bush rules to 300 per cent in this bill is a direct challenge to Bush, as is the adding of pregnant women. More remarkable, though subtle, in that it’s not even been discussed widely, is the new subsidy for existing employer insurance (section 301). It really is an incrementalist encroachment into the private sector. Here are key details:
That’s not providing subsidized insurance to people who don’t have it, and are typically assumed to not be able to get it or afford it. That is providing subsidies to people who currently have traditional insurance through their employer.
Or that oppose it.
Well, we do know the President is clarity- and diction-”challenged” and that doesn’t help. Why didn’t he just explain things plainly, as dumb DLS has done? Pregnant women are being added, the additional-block-grant game is just that, a game, when it comes to parents, crowd-out really isn’t being reduced, just studied, the tobacco tax is regressive and counter-productive (outrageous in the case of cigars, like the 10,000% tax on ammunition sought by anti-gun members of Congress in the past), and the subsidy is being aimed at existing employer insurance, which really is a stealthy (it’s not discussed or admitted by the bill’s proponents) encroachment into the private sector. And this is a program that provides federal money to “match” state expenditures, and federal, not state law — this really is incremental federalization of health care. Many will say “Yes!” to the question, “Is that what we want?” but we should be honest first about what is wanted and what is sought. And openly defying Bush’s new rules and obvious objectives for the program of course is risking and even earning a veto. Bush is very weak and while many of you may think he simply was stupid, he probably was counseled that given the details of the bill, he can veto it. (Not that such a big spender can object to it on cost grounds alone.)
Now let’s see if Congress will override the veto, will try to pass the same legislation multiple times (very childish as well as counter-productive), or will modify the bill and make it cleaner and less expansive and ambitious, and dare Bush to veto it, too. (Lower the poverty-level threshold to 250 per cent from 300, for example; strike the new features like pregnant women and employer insurance subsidies; make it funded out of general revenue, something of a cop-out but no longer regressive; they can override those rules they most object to if they conform to others that the public more easily grasps and if they drop what is truly seen as expansion in the scope of the program — make it primarily or even only about poor children next time)
In case you didn’t notice, the bill claims to address crowd-out by studying the matter — while extending the subsidy for child insurance to people with insurance through their employer.
We know what results are desired by proponents.
Let’s see, if you want to address children’s health is there anything more preventative than pre-natal care?
This would be the predictable argument for adding pregnant women. (Ironically, often it’s by many who are zealots about abortion and government-financed abortion services.)
The result of women receiving assistance is
which probably was not merely coincidental when the bill was written.
DLS,
So what? Try some logical thinking. A pregnant woman applies for aid. She fills out the paperwork and is found to qualify. Why should another batch of paperwork be generated when the child is born? Did her income suddenly increase when the child was born, making her and her child ineligible? I don’t think so. Whatever objection your 6:58 post was trying to make doesn’t make much sense.
Grow up.
She gets on S-CHIP (doesn’t have to be on Medicaid already), then her child gets on the program as well. The program grows. This is probably the intent of the authors of the bill; the same is likely for the incursion into employer-based insurance. (There is no doubt the new state options would be exercised; the state governments love the federal matching-rate funds.)
The program was going to “grow” by the addition of that child in any case whether the mother received care while pregnant or not otherwise she wouldn’t have qualified for the care. You’re not being logical at all. Remember that you were quoting a report on crowd out at one point just days ago that was done months ago and addressed the initial House proposal, not the existing compromise. Is that still what you’re thinking of when speaking of crowding out?
And to be brutally honest about it, the worry about crowd-out is overblown in any case. Why? Because if current trends continue (And there is no reason to suppose they won’t.) the people at this level of income are going to be losing their employer provided health care in the not too distant future in any case. I work for a small business and at the rate insurance costs are being jacked up who knows how much longer they’ll be able to afford it? I have yet to see any proposal that includes leaving the existing insurance companies in place as they currently practice business that will do anything to improve the situation.
[...] bloggers and pundits take note of the dire straits facing Republicans in 2008, the notion of voting Republican for President to maintain divided [...]
[...] Joe Gandelman wrote an interesting post today on Bush Kids Health Plan Veto, Republican Kool Aid And ChildrenHere’s a quick excerptBush has a solid-core of backers who will back him on anything –even if it means drinking political Kool Aid that will hurt their increasingly unpopular party’s long and short term interests.. 4. Bush has turned over a new political … [...]
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