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TechnoratiHealth is the second blessing that we mortals are capable of; a blessing that money cannot buy.
- Izaak Walton, Epistle to the Reader
So you were surprised? Blame it on your short memory. If it were longer, life would have fewer surprises. Consider George Bush and health insurance for children. He likes children, he loves money and he hates the thought of federal help for medical care. Current events come first-the history lesson later.
In July it was reported that Mr. Bush is determined to block a major expansion of the Children's Health Insurance Program. CHIP, as it is known, is a federal-state program that was created to provide health insurance to low-income families who earn too much to qualify for federal health programs but not enough to pay for health insurance. When CHIP money is allotted to a state the state must use it within 3 years.
In 1997, CHIP's first year, Congress allocated $48 billion to the program. In 2007 Congress wants to increase CHIP's funding so that more children can receive benefits. When Mr. Bush hears talk of more medical benefits for children he conjures up an image of a bunch of camels pushing their noses under the tent where the affluent are seeing doctors but paying for the visit themselves.
To improve CHIP the House has voted to spend $75 billion over the next 5 years, the Senate has voted to spend $60 billion and Mr. Bush wants to spend $30 billion. Mr. Bush isn't simply being penurious. He's considering the consequences of insuring everyone. He thinks once the 9 million children in the United States who have no health insurance get insurance, everyone will want it and then we'll have the federal government running our health care system.
Mr. Bush is not only concerned about poor children taking advantage of the affluent. He's also concerned about how Democrats want to pay for the program. They want to increase taxes on tobacco from $.33 a pack to $1.00 a pack and they want to decrease payments from Medicare to private insurance companies who care for the elderly.According to a New York Times report, Allan Hubbard, an assistant to Mr. Bush said if the bill became law, we'd be closer to a "single-payer health care system with rationing and price controls." Mr. Bush's attitude towards health care does not comes as a surprise to those with memories that go back as far as the time when he was governor of Texas. That's when CHIP was born.
In 1997 Texas was allotted $561 million that it was required to spend in full by 2000. According to the Dallas Morning News, mid-way through 2000 Texas had only spent $112 million leaving $449 million unspent. By June 2000, 123,000 Texas families had applied for assistance but only 27,000 children had been enrolled. According to the Children's Defense Fund Report, Texas ranked 45th among the states enrolling children in CHIP. Texas was one of only 8 states where the number of children with any form of health insurance declined from 1997 to 1999.
Failure to implement CHIP was not Mr. Bush's only success in protecting Texans from the greedy needy. His other successes were described by U.S. District Judge William Wayne Justice. On August 14, 2000 Judge Justice entered a ruling on a case that had been filed against Texas for its failure to live up to a 1996 consent decree involving other health care programs. The judge gave Mr. Bush a report card that looked a lot like ones he probably got in grade school. It had lots of "needs improvement" on it. He said Mr. Bush had failed to improve children's access to Medicaid, checkups under the program's managed care arm were inadequate and fewer than 10 percent of children were receiving immunizations. He said the state had failed to inform indigent families about the availability of health services. He said managed care plans to which some indigent Texans had been assigned were not providing the required services and 1 million eligible individuals had received no dental care. In response to the judge's findings Mr. Bush said: "[W]e've got a good record in signing up children for Medicaid and we're going to continue to do so." He must have been thinking of something the judge had overlooked.
Mr. Bush's opposition to the increased funding is because, as he explains it, it is a step "down the path to government-run health care for every American." There is not a child in the country who lacks medical benefits who would want that to happen even if additional funding might save some of their lives. And, on the bright side of things, if the additional funding is vetoed, some children will end up dying thus reducing the number of children who are uninsured.
Christopher Brauchli
brauchli.56@post.harvard.edu
For political commentary see my web page http://humanraceandothersports.com
19 Comments so far
Show AllIt isn't a question of money: Bush has got plenty and can get more. No monies spent for kids will reduce the graft of this "war".
It is simply that none of Bush's kids will be required to do without a blessed thing all their live-long days.
Bush is not capable of caring.
To bad Congress couldn't find the money some where else. It's not fair to smokers only to carry the burden. I hope he does veto it. I'm all for healthcare for everyone.
ezeflyer July 28th, 2007 3:03 pm
Socialized law? Why - when we have the best justice system that money can buy?
As anyone SHOULD know - a justice system that you have to buy is simply not justice!
Justice for the rich only is not justice at all.
Quoting SoundChaser July 28th, 2007 3:16 pm:
"Health care is only for the wealthy. Those who can't afford it don't deserve it. What could be simpler?"
Gosh, that sounds an awful lot like Ron Paul's position. Let's not forget this part of the equation when considering candidates. It's not just about the war, it's about all of the issues that go toward making a livable and decent world for all.
Bush's idea of a good plan is to allow insurance to be another tax deduction. This also means that people who still have insurance were they work may have to pay taxes on it.
This will give the wealthier people yet another tax deduction. For others, they make so little that they still will not be able to afford health insurance. The tax deduction will be meaningless.
This brings to mind the story of the rich child that was asked to write about a poor family. He wrote "Everyone in the family was poor. The parents were poor. The children were poor. The housekeeper, gardener, cook, and all of the maids were poor." This is how narrowing Bush views the rest of us.
Bush's views on health care make me sick.
First off, on July 10th, our Decider/Inquisitor/Commander Guy/Corporate and Religious Right Mouthpiece-in-chief made the incredibly callous and clueless remark that "people have access to health care in America. After all, you just go to an emergency room."
Sure, and the rich and poor alike are free to sleep under bridges, too.
WTF? Was Bush's line ad libbed, or did somebody actually write that line for him? My guess is the latter. The idea that "there is plenty of free health care in emergency rooms" has been tested, pushed, and refined by right-wing think tanks for several years. It finally percolated its way to the top, and blew out through Bush's ignorant mouth.
Now I don't want to go around seizin' on every misquote or mistake that POTUS makes, for that would make for a whole lot of seizin' (to everything there is a seizin', so to speak), and I simply haven't got that kind of time.
But our Compassionate Conservative-in-chief has gotten my dander up again by objecting on philosophical grounds to a bipartisan Senate proposal to boost the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) by $35 billion over five years by levying a 61-cent-a-pack increase in the federal excise tax on cigarettes.
By threatening to veto the proposed legislation, Bush has essentially told the 6.6 million children currently covered by SCHIP, and the 3.3 million presently uninsured American children for whom these additional funds would be used to provide medical care, to "Go to the emergency room."
Mr. Bush apparently has no philosophical objections to the number of children equivalent to the entire population of Oregon going without health care. Why should he? We all know that he also has no philosophical objections to the number of Iraqis he's killed equivalent to the entire population of Austin, Texas.
After all, it has been made eminently clear these past six years that the ability of Mr. Bush and his ilk to care about life is inversely proportional to the number of cells something has. If we were raising the excise tax on cigarettes to protect, say, one-hundred-celled blastocysts, well, then, that would be different.
canabalistic capitalism cares for no man, woman or child. All power to the dollar and its attainment--Everything else be damned.
bush* isn't a capitalist. everything he is and possesses has has been given to him, including the pResidency. He has never earned a thing. bush is a meglomaniac sociopath with daddy AND mommy issues. His sense of entitlement is appalling.
Indigent children do not vote nor do they contribute to the Republican party. There are no lobbyists for children.
Why do the people commenting on this article expect Bush to approve health care for children? Are they deficient in logical thinking?
Bush recognizes that this program signifies that slippery slope towards decency and compassion for the most vulnerable. We will have none of that.
And if you believe Bush's lies, I have a bridge in Brooklyn that I'll sell you real cheap.
Meanwhile, a billion Buddhists go about their day and the grass still grows on the hillside.
To Bush every dollar saved goes towards building the next bomb for Jesus.
Health care is only for the wealthy. Those who can't afford it don't deserve it. What could be simpler?
This is the old/new order. This is the future.
Global fascist domination is at hand.
Get ready to fight or get used to it.
relayer@q.com
Kudos to Annabelle for naming the microscopic dot that has to be born because we are a "culture of life" -- sounds like that only applies to "non-visible life". Of course Bush has no ability to think logically. I should think that a few of the rest of us can still think.
Care of our children must be our primary concern. They are our future and it is our duty as citizens of this country to care for those who cannot care for themselves, namely children. I have always thought that the right to lifers should adopt at least one unwanted child before they did anything else on the topic.
What a hypocrite--"we believe in life, but forget about the children, Bush". For all of his lowlife behaviors, this one tops it all.
As a doctor, I believe in socialized medicine. But I have to ask, why only socialized medicine? Why not socialized law, or food, or shelter, or education, or everything that we REALLY NEED? Why not share the burden instead of supporting a parasitic plutocracy that hoards over eighty percent of all wealth and has power over everything and everyone?
So let's see, here, we, with the "best medical system in the world", are actually 39th, just below Costa Rica. Jamiaca has a higher infant survival rate than we do. The insurance industry takes 30% of EVERY dollar spent on health care here, while providing NOTHING, and in fact, spending most of their time trying to figure out how NOT to pay for anything. 18,000 Americans will die this year due to late or non existent care. Studies from the world show that when profit isn't the main goal, the people's health improves, and the costs are FAR lower than what we pay to be killed slowly.
W's problem is that he has NO human compassion whatsoever. He learned his lessons from his witch of a mother. Not an ounce of compassion in the family at all. They love money, and to hell with humans.
The argument I keep hearing is that old one, "Do you want the GOVERNMENT to make decisions about your health care?". I would prefer that to some money grubbing paper pusher whose whole goal is to NOT pay for your care. Remember this: When gov't is involved, there isn't a profit motive, and it can be done for about 3%. When profit is the be all and end all, like it is now, it costs you 30% and you get miserable care, by and large, because real care does cost money. We would be saving so much in insurance costs if we just cut the companies out of it, we could pay for most of it, if not all, right there.
Your healthcare should NOT be held hostage to the highest bidder, nor should you be put in the position of haggling for price when you or a family member need healthcare, like W and his buddies and their "health savings accounts" want. When someone is in need, you are NOT going to be dickering for the best deal, you need them taken care of.
The ENTIRE for profit systme of healthcare is a fucking of the American people. We deserve better than this. The whole damned system should be scrapped, and profit should NOT be a motive in it, PERIOD. WHy do you think we can import the SAME drugs from Canada as we get here but pay 50% the price? It's because Canada doesn't think that their people and their health should be held hostage FOR PROFIT. Our gov't thinks that you are nothing but a bottomless pocket to be picked. FUCK PROFIT. People's LIVES should be far more important than that. But this is Reagan's America, where everything has a value and nothing has any worth.
A Heartless "Philosophy"
by Robert Weissman
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/07/25/2767/
Excerpts:
"SCHIP is a complement to Medicaid, and provides health insurance to uninsured children from low-income families, typically those making up to 200 percent of the poverty line ($34,000). It has had enormous success in its 10 years of existence. Four million children receive health insurance through SCHIP. It has reduced the number of children in families at or slightly above the poverty line who are uninsured by about a quarter."
"SCHIP is now up for reauthorization. Because of medical inflation, the program needs more money to provide insurance to the same number of kids. Because the program has been a clear winner, members of Congress from both parties want to provide this needed funding, and to expand the program further."
"But President Bush says no."
"'I believe government cannot provide affordable health care,' Bush said at a media event last week. 'I believe it would cause the quality of care to diminish. I believe there would be lines and rationing over time. If Congress continues to insist upon expanding health care through the SCHIP program — which, by the way, would entail a huge tax increase for the American people — I'll veto the bill.'"
"Here's what is most remarkable about this philosophical objection from the White House: It isn't shared by the for-profit insurance industry."
Make sure that the microscopic dot gets protected and gets born....but, once it is born it is on it's own, Sweetheart. Don't expect the compassionate conservatives to make sure you have adequate health care, or an adequate education. And, if you survive bad health and a poor education you can plan on a war somewhere that is keeping those same compassionate conservatives in pocket change
RE: MEANWHILE...
Meanwhile, while progressive energies are tied up w/massive threats to democracy at home and murderous invasions abroad...