For anyone still questioning whether this President is the beacon of compassionate conservatism he claims to be, look no further than his veto of SCHIP. Vetoing a popular children’s health insurance program on the merits of fiscal conservatism is a new low even for our misguided President.
Tomorrow's vote marks the culmination of the most disingenuous and deliberately misleading debate I have ever witnessed. The partisan, deceptive talking points from the Bush White House have been parroted on Capitol Hill by extremist Republicans. Their message points have been disputed not only by independent experts, but by dozens of sensible Republicans, including Senators Grassley, Roberts and Hatch, some of the most respected members of the Senate.
The cost of the SCHIP program is equivalent to 41 days of the war in Iraq. The President doesn’t get to feign fiscal responsibility over children’s health care while requesting $190 billion more for a war that over 70% of Americans oppose.
I find it inexplicable that House Republicans have decided to follow the President down his path of denial and deceit. Democrats have given them two weeks to get their facts straight, and still they spread falsehoods claiming that this bill will ensure families earning $83,000 and lead to socialized medicine.
The facts are simple: working families are having great difficulty providing their children with health insurance. This is not a program about poor kids, as most impoverished children are already eligible for state Medicaid programs. SCHIP provides health care to children of working families who make too much to receive welfare but can't afford private insurance. The bipartisan bill preserves coverage for the 6.6 million children currently covered by the program and extends coverage to an additional 3.8 million children. This is a grant program – not an entitlement program – that is run through private doctors and established health care plans.
I also don’t want to hear that the Democrats did not compromise. The bill the President vetoed – and that the House and Senate passed with bipartisan majorities – WAS a compromise. Those still unclear about this fact need only look to the 68 Senators, including 18 Republicans, and 43 Governors, including 16 Republicans, who support the bill.
I would like to hope that having the facts on our side would be enough to get the votes we need to override the President’s veto in the House. It will be a sad day for the state of our country when providing health care to kids falls by the wayside in favor of overspending on a misguided war.
But let this be a wake up call to us all. If the President’s veto is not overridden tomorrow, we must lay the foundation for accountability at the ballot box because the message will be clear --- progress on health care reform will only be possible under a new visionary President and a Congress that listens to the American people.