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Bush A*&holery continues re: SCHIP

bean

[image removed. damn those protected images! Picture the President making an idiotic face.]

Under the headline “White House Acts to Limit Health Plan for Children,” I just read this gem:

The Bush administration, continuing its fight to stop states from expanding the popular Children’s Health Insurance Program, has adopted new standards that would make it much more difficult for New York, California and others to extend coverage to children in middle-income families.

Administration officials outlined the new standards in a letter sent to state health officials on Friday evening, in the middle of a month-long Congressional recess. In interviews, they said the changes were aimed at returning the Children’s Health Insurance Program to its original focus on low-income children and to make sure the program did not become a substitute for private health coverage.

After learning of the new policy, some state officials said today that it could cripple their efforts to cover more children by imposing standards that could not be met.

So. During a recess, the president acts to prevent implementation of a law that Congress has passed and for which it could likely override what would be a very unpopular veto. Because the Bushies are so afraid (at least ostensibly) of the specter of socialism (so far off at this point that it’s laughable), that they prevent kids (KIDS!) from getting health insurance.

It gets worse. One of the conditions the Bush administration wants to impose is to mandate that states which set their cutoff for SCHIP participation at a level the federal government deems too high (above about $50,000 per year for a family of four) must require a family to be uninsured for a year before the children of that family can benefit from SCHIP. So a kid must be uninsured for a whole year before she or he can be covered by SCHIP. Nevermind what might happen during that year.

Jaw on the ground yet? Mine is. Can I hear it for the so-called champions of a culture of life?

Go read the whole article to find out more about the Bush administration’s vindictiveness.

12 thoughts on Bush A*&holery continues re: SCHIP

  2. ugh, just ugh. That’s pretty low to push that through during a break, but I guess it fits in with the current admin’s operating style.

    Perhaps I’m crazy, but don’t most parents make decisions based on what’s best for the kids, or at least try?

    I am sure there will be some parents who drop private insurance and go to SCHIP for what the gov’t may consider the ‘wrong’ reason. Still, shouldn’t we trust parents to know what’s best for their kids?

  3. First and foremost, it is important to note that SCHIP hasn’t passed yet. Bush’s behavior, while disgusting, isn’t preventing the execution of a bill thats been singed into law by some kind of recess dirty trick. What Bush is doing is circling the wagons for the fight thats going to come once congress comes back in session and the House and Senate versions of the proposal get reconciled and hes facing a veto override. In the greater scheme of things Bush is trying to scare the Democrats away from the issue so that a big fight over the expansion doesn’t become an election year issue. That might seem like splitting hairs, but precision is important when you’re talking about politics. Its even more important when the other side has you completely out-gunned on the spin front.

    On more of a tangential note, the plans rattling around congress for the SCHIP expansion worry me. The money is supposed to come from a $.61 per pack price hike on cigarettes. Paying for SCHIP like that is a bad idea. Not only does basic economic theory tell you that an increase of that size is going to reduce the number of units sold, but such a tax disproportionately effects lower income individuals. I’m a little uncomfortable with the funds being used to pay for a vital program like SCHIP being guaranteed to run short and coming mostly from people who can’t really afford to foot the bill.

  4. The best part of all, of course, is that the California housing market is imploding right now, and a lot of middle-class people are desperately trying to keep up on their mortgage payments and don’t have a lot of extra cash to spare for luxuries like health insurance.

    I guess it’s the Bush way — impoverish people and then make them beg for the few benefits you’ll allow them to have. Viva Bush!

  5. oh more hyperventilation over things most of you simply don’t understand. Is it really so unreasonable to (essentially) deny families with incomes over 250% of the poverty line free or even subsidized insurance. NYS wants to extend this benefit to families with incomes up to 82k annually. Among your problems is a tendency to think, Oh, They’re Taking Away Something From The Children!! The Children!! There is no reason to beleive that government should provide things, even very desirable things, to people who can otherwise afford them on their own. Please, study some economics, some history, and seek to gain some common sense. And let up a bit on the dignitude and self-righteous breast beating.

  6. #4: The extreme condescension of your comment makes me believe several things about you:

    a) You believe that people who approve of public health care, especially universal care (although that’s not even at issue here) have never had a serious thought about the issues involved before, or done any research into them. That is not true. Your position is one I held in the past–before I studied economics, studied history, and above all gained some common sense. I realize many professional economists share your views (although most of them express them more politely); however, many do not. This is a political debate, not just an academic one, as often happens when lives and the definition of human rights are on the line.

    b) Concerning common sense, I conclude that yours has never been exercised by exposure to any degree of poverty, particularly to persons who struggle with health problems without complete coverage. Perhaps you are still on your parents’ excellent private insurance? Perhaps you are blessed with good health? Try for a moment to put yourself in the position of a person with a chronic health problem, or small children requiring check-ups and vaccinations and emergency care, or simply with a toothache. And then imagine that you cannot pay for any of this.

    If you find yourself thinking, “I’m resourceful, independent and tough! None of this would be a problem for me,” then imagine these situations applying to someone you care about, who is less tough than you, and alone in the world.

    No one can persuade someone whose mind and emotions are strongly invested in a position. However, one of the many good results of exercising one’s common sense is the realization that most issues are far more complex, affecting different people in many different ways, than may appear on first glance. And another good result is compassion, even for those with whom you disagree.

  7. William says:

    I’m a little uncomfortable with the funds being used to pay for a vital program like SCHIP being guaranteed to run short and coming mostly from people who can’t really afford to foot the bill.

    I echo your discomfort with the way this SCHIP expansion is being funded. But I am OK with the cigarette tax as money source in the short term while the program becomes better established and can then be funded by other things already part of the federal (and state) budgets.

  8. I echo your discomfort with the way this SCHIP expansion is being funded. But I am OK with the cigarette tax as money source in the short term while the program becomes better established and can then be funded by other things already part of the federal (and state) budgets.

    The problem is thats theres no such thing as “short term” in Washington. The only way laws or taxes ever go away is if they have sunset clauses or someone comes along and starts slashing taxes. The big problem with tying anything to cigarette taxes is that you already have a lot tied to them and its a sinking ship.

    You have to accept that this method of payment is going to be viewed as a long term solution. Basic economics tells you that a $.61 increase in the cigarette tax is going to do two things immediately: convince a lot of people on the line to finally quit, and convince a lot of other smokers to reduce their consumption. In both cases you have fewer cigarettes sold and fewer taxes collected. On top of that you have smokers dying every day, further reducing the taxes collected. Then you have all the other people who were planning on quitting anyway and represent the general downward trend smoking has seen in the past few years. All this at a time when many cities are giving people even greater incentives to quit or cut back in the form of public smoking bans and the baby-boomer generation is hitting the age when their doctors are demanding they quit.

    Now, I’m generally pretty libertarian, but the pragmatist in me likes SCHIP because it ends up saving more through regular medical care and prevention than it costs. I think its a good program and needs to continue, but we can’t just will it into being. This is a program that costs tens of billions of dollars and they need to come from somewhere. If the financing we’ve lined up to pay for it is going to fall through, we need to consider where the money will come from to cover this new obligation. A new tax is unlikely because of political concerns. That leaves deficit spending (which we can’t really afford to do much of after Bush) or cutting other programs (likely within department) in order to pay for SCHIP. Is SCHIP more important that Medicaid? Medicare? Social Security? WIC? These are the likely consequences when the funding fails to come through, and I think they ought to be considered.

  10. Channeling hell, that’s a pretty outright libertarian set of views up there.

    MB – you might ponder, were you given to such things, the difference between $87K a year in rural Iowa, where one can buy a 3200 sqare foot home for $600 a month, suitable for housing said family of six, and NYC, where that $600 might pay the co-op fee (but not the separate mortgage) on a one bedroom apartment in a semi-decent neighborhood, which would drop into the living room of the aforementioned house and rattle. Which would not house a family of six under any circumstances but sheer desperation – yet costs more than three times as much when all is said and done.

  11. Is it really so unreasonable to (essentially) deny families with incomes over 250% of the poverty line free or even subsidized insurance. NYS wants to extend this benefit to families with incomes up to 82k annually.

    Yes, it is.

    Just because you and your spouse each make $41,000 a year, that doesn’t mean that either of your employers offers health insurance. Which means you have to buy health insurance privately. Which is $1,500 a month for a family of three, minimum, not counting your deductible.

    Does that $87K still sound so princely?

  12. MB – you might ponder, were you given to such things, the difference between $87K a year in rural Iowa, where one can buy a 3200 sqare foot home for $600 a month, suitable for housing said family of six, and NYC, where that $600 might pay the co-op fee (but not the separate mortgage) on a one bedroom apartment in a semi-decent neighborhood, which would drop into the living room of the aforementioned house and rattle. Which would not house a family of six under any circumstances but sheer desperation – yet costs more than three times as much when all is said and done.

    Because MB seems to have failed so spectacularly in representing an opposing viewpoint, I’ll play devil’s advocate here (although I don’t really agree with what I’m about to say in this case).

    Affordable housing and what constitutes a good wage is definitely deplorable in New York. The lack of children’s health care is a problem. Still, how is that the problem of smokers? The SCHIP expansion is to be paid for with cigarette tax revenues but, aside from smokers being a generally demonized group, how is it their responsibility to fix that problem through an increased tax burden? Why not tax beer, or chocolate, or condoms, or luxury vehicles? Why is it that smokers are singled out as the population to bear the burden of making children’s healthcare more affordable?

    Perhaps a tax which singles out a specific group is unfair. Lets imagine SCHIP was going to be paid for using general tax revenue. Even then you single out one group of people (those who have not had children) to bear the majority of the burden for another group (those who do). Why is it the responsibility of a gainfully employed homosexual man in Chicago to pay for the health care of a child in Florida? Why should individuals or couples who chose not to have children be financially penalized? Why should families which have health care through an employer be forced to subsidize those who don’t?

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