This second veto comes approximately two months after the first veto by the President.
President Bush vetoed an expansion of the federally funded, state-run health insurance program for poor children for a second time Wednesday, telling Congress the bill "moves our country's health care system in the wrong direction."Maybe saving 7 billion a year(You know the saying around Washington, a billion here and a billion there and soon we're talking real money) in a federal budget in the trillions is good policy, but I see it as more likely to be bad politics for the GOP in the 2008 Election. I that while the Schip override vote was taking place last October. Namely that Democrats will use this to hammer republicans next fall in Congressional races. Look at the Republicans, they won't vote for children's health care.In his veto message, President Bush calls on Congress to extend funding for the current program.
In his veto message, Bush said the bill is almost a duplicate of the proposal he spiked in October.
"Because the Congress has chosen to send me an essentially identical bill that has the same problems as the flawed bill I previously vetoed, I must veto this legislation, too," he said in a statement released by the White House.
The bill would have expanded the State Children's Health Insurance Program by nearly $35 billion over five years, the same as the measure Bush vetoed October 3.
The president had proposed adding $5 billion to the program and said the version he vetoed would have encouraged families to leave the private insurance market for the federally funded, state-run program.
Democratic leaders said the new version addressed Republican objections by tightening restrictions on illegal immigrants receiving SCHIP benefits, capping the income levels of families that qualify for the program and preventing adults from receiving benefits.
That's an unpopular view of this legislation among conservatives, but I think I'm closer to the mark than they who say or think this will have no effect come November. We'll have to see who is right.
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General politics
Tags: President Bush, Schip
Comments (4)
Well, Bush and the Gop guys... (Below threshold)1. Posted by Glenn Koons | December 13, 2007 3:31 PM | Score: 1 (1 votes cast)
Well, Bush and the Gop guys and gals in the entire Congress have been eating the Dem's lunch all year. The AG bill, spending, defense, even getting King's view in the House on Christmas passed though Dems love Allah more than Christ apparently!!LOL. All these defeats for the so called Majority should show the voters , if they had some common sense and decency, that the Dems are failures as leaders. Vote the bums out and put the Pubs back in. After all only 17 House seats separate the Parties.
1. Posted by Glenn Koons | December 13, 2007 3:31 PM |
Score: 1 (1 votes cast)
Posted on December 13, 2007 15:31
2. Posted by Jim Addison | December 13, 2007 3:31 PM | Score: 1 (1 votes cast)
Such things never have any demonstrable effect. Every election year, the early polls about "voters' concerns" see education and health care near the top of the list. And yet, exit polling invariably shows those issues had no bearing whatever on how people actually voted.
If there is some large constituency out there clamoring for people making over $65,000 per year and whose kids ALREADY HAVE health insurance to get free government coverage, they keep awfully quiet.
The simple fact is that virtually all of the voters who hunger for more from the government teat and decide their vote on that basis already vote for Democrats. Bush will earn more votes for Republicans by actually picking up the veto pen than could possibly be lost by refusing to pass out candy.
Sure, it's "only" $7 billion a year (assuming one believes the cost estimates - ha!). As has been apocryphally attributed to the late Sen. Everett Dirksen, according to legend in response to a plea from Sen. Hubert Humphrey that a particular provision cost "only $1 billion":
"A billion here and a billion there, and pretty soon you're talking some real money!"
2. Posted by Jim Addison | December 13, 2007 3:31 PM |
Score: 1 (1 votes cast)
Posted on December 13, 2007 15:31
3. Posted by Lee Ward | December 13, 2007 11:17 PM | Score: -1 (1 votes cast)
You're absolutely correct, Bill. It's simply A Question of Priorities.
3. Posted by Lee Ward | December 13, 2007 11:17 PM |
Score: -1 (1 votes cast)
Posted on December 13, 2007 23:17
4. Posted by P. Bunyan | December 14, 2007 2:44 PM | Score: 0 (0 votes cast)
I once heard the definition of insanity was doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. This bill, along with the neo-comms repeated attempts to attach a guaranteed Al Qaeda victory date to the Iraq funding bills, proves that the leftists controlling the congress are not only communists, but insane ones at that.
4. Posted by P. Bunyan | December 14, 2007 2:44 PM |
Score: 0 (0 votes cast)
Posted on December 14, 2007 14:44