Turning Up the Pressure for CHIP

Wed, 10/03/2007 - 2:31pm

House Democrats will begin chatting up the House Republicans today to gain a two-thirds majority to override President Bush’s veto of the SCHIP bill, which would increase funding for CHIP by $35 Billion over the next five years. Congressmen and women, start your schmoozing!

This bill seeks to bring more healthcare coverage for approximately 10 million American children, whose families do not qualify for Medicare, but are unable to afford private insurance coverage.

President Bush vetoed the bill this morning, saying the increase in funding would defeat the original purpose of SCHIP: to give healthcare coverage to low-income families. What does President Bush consider low-income? Families of four living at or below 200% of the poverty level, or $40,000 a year. Everyone else, apparently, should be able to afford private healthcare coverage. The increased funding of this bill, Bush says, would “federalize” medicine and persuade higher income families to choose government-run healthcare over private healthcare.

While the Senate voted 67-29 in favor of the bill on Tuesday, the House voted 265-159, which is not enough votes to overturn the President’s veto. House Democrats have vocalized their disappointment with the President’s actions, and expressed their plans to work with House Republicans to gain the majority.

I am tempted to rant about how this veto makes a joke of Bush’s compassionate conservative values he boasted once upon a time, and reiterate how sick children cannot attend school and advance academically; but I’ll end on a happier note.

While the health and well-being of 10 million children now rest in the fate of our Congress’s ability to find common ground, it is nice to see the President making use of his veto pen. From CNN.com:

After not using his veto power at all during his first four years, the president has vetoed three other bills in his second term: two on stem-cell research legislation and one on a war funding bill with a Democratic timetable for withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq.

:) !