The Daily Background
| Bush set to veto bipartisan children’s health care plan
by Arlen Parsa
President Bush is set to cast a death veto on a measure which would insure uninsured children:
The White House said on Saturday that President Bush would veto a bipartisan plan to expand the Children’s Health Insurance Program, drafted over the last six months by senior members of the Senate Finance Committee.
The vow puts Mr. Bush at odds with the Democratic majority in Congress, with a substantial number of Republican lawmakers and with many governors of both parties, who want to expand the popular program to cover some of the nation’s eight million uninsured children.
The stated reason why the White House wants to kill the bill is because it would need a tax increase to fund it. Yes, a big scary tax increase in the form of a few more cents on the cigarette tax which the White House calls “neither necessary nor advisable to fund the program appropriately.”
Another reason why the White House is planning to veto the program: “The proposal would dramatically expand the Children’s Health Insurance Program, adding nonpoor children to the program.” Yes, that’s right, they’d rather kill the program (which is set to expire) that provides health care for poor children, rather than let “nonpoor children” be insured. Talk about cutting off your nose to spite your face, and in this case neither objective (providing insurance for both poor kids and “nonpoor” kids) isn’t exactly a terrible idea.
Imagine you are Missouri governor Matt Blunt running for reelection and fighting for your political life. President Bush veto’s the bipartisan SCHIP bill. Suddenly you have 106,000 or so poor kids without health care, a very tight state budget and a whole lot of angry voters. Vetoing SCHIP is the Republican equivalent of Gotterdammerung. A self inflicted wound from which the Republicans probably won’t recover.
[…] off their threats to veto a bill which funds health care for poor children, the Administration is signaling that it opposes […]