The Inky Descends Into SCHIP Wingnuttia

(With more than a little help from David Espo and the AP here, I should add…)

So let’s start with the lede, shall we?

WASHINGTON - Shrugging off a barrage of political attacks, House Republicans are on track to hand President Bush a victory this week by upholding his veto of legislation that would expand children's health coverage.

This is right out of fantasyland. A universally unpopular president vetoed a universally popular program to provide health insurance for our kids, aided and abetted in no small part by ideologically sympathetic politicians and media loudmouths (and yes, I acknowledge that, at this point, the veto may hold in the House). That is a victory?

Rep. Rob Bishop called the vetoed bill a "dumb idea" for relying on higher tobacco taxes to pay for insuring children, a provision he said would create a need for new smokers.

And Rep. Chris Cannon said that while he agreed with (Utah Repug Sen. Orrin) Hatch on one point, they part company on another. "This is a profoundly moral issue," he said in an interview. "But that doesn't mean the government should do it. Government isn't very good at doing some things, mostly because of rigidity."

Proof? Evidence? Anywhere in sight? Hello??

And it figures that Bishop would take his talking point directly from The Heritage Foundation (here – typically ludicrous to suggest that people would start smoking if SCHIP were passed; somehow I have a feeling that someone as astute financially as Sen. Charles Grassley would know the calculations of what kind of revenue is available to fund SCHIP based on the purchase of tobacco products in this country.)

While a handful of Democratic lawmakers who opposed the measure are expected to vote to override the veto, not a single Republican has announced plans to switch.

"We will not see an erosion of our votes," Rep. Eric Cantor of Virginia, a member of the GOP leadership, predicted recently.

I would say that I feel the same way about this issue now as I did about the “General Betray Us” ad (namely, fine, go ahead and fight us on this, because you’ll lose), but the problem is that this hurts the kids, people.

This hurts the kids.

How many goddamn times do I or anyone who supports the SCHIP bill need to keep pointing that out?

Meanwhile, House Republicans distributed a survey by pollster David Winston, with suggested talking points.

It said critics of the legislation can win the public debate if they say they favor "covering uninsured children without expanding government coverage to adults, illegal immigrants and those who already have insurance." The Associated Press obtained a copy of the poll.

Typical garbage; as this Think Progress link notes (with Dubya leading the wrongheaded “cheerleading” here, as usual)…

Center for American Progress health care analyst Jeanne Lambrew notes that the section 106 of the bill specifically ensures that there will not be any expansion of eligibility. “It overwhelming targets resources to low-income children and it discourages expansion to families with more moderate incomes by lowering the share the federal government will pay for such coverage.”

The blogger DemFromCT sums up what I have to say on this pretty well here (and this was an excellent interview Keith Olbermann conducted with the Frosts last light on “Countdown,” echoing much of what we are all saying and more).

This is a stinking dead dog of a loser issue, Repugs. If you want to make sure thousands of kids get sick and extend further financial hardship to their parents…well, unfortunately, there’s only so much I can do to stop you.

But you will face a reckoning next November for this as well as the Iraq war and a whole host of other issues where you chose obstruction instead of cooperation. And if you want to tether yourself to President Numbskull and sink right along with him, then you deserve what you get.