Perhaps more than any policy decision this year, the president’s decision to veto expansion of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (S-CHIP) was spectacularly dumb. It was bad politics, bad policy, and based on bad reasoning. Lawmakers from both parties, governors from both parties, medical professionals, and children’s’ advocates all agree that Bush’s nonsensical decision does nothing but hurt children.<\/p>\n
It’s striking, then, that Bush’s would-be Republican successors all agree with the ridiculous White House line.<\/p>\n
If you’ve been following the debate, you no doubt know that practically everything the Bush gang has said about the bipartisan S-CHIP compromise is wrong. If you need a refresher, the WaPo’s usually-mild-mannered Eugene Robinson<\/a> slammed the president pretty hard today, saying Bush’s veto “should shock the consciences of every American.” He added that the White House’s rationale on the policy is “a pack of flat-out lies.”<\/p>\n But they’re lies that Rudy Giuliani, Mitt Romney, Fred Thompson, and John McCain happen to believe<\/a>.<\/p>\n The four leading Republican presidential candidates have aligned themselves with President Bush’s veto on Wednesday of an expanded health insurance program for children, once again testing the political risk of appearing in lock step with a president who has low approval ratings and some critics of the veto within their party. […]<\/p>\n In an interview yesterday on New Hampshire radio, former Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani framed the insurance program itself as a “typical Democratic, Clinton kind of thing” that substitutes government solutions for private section options.<\/p>\n “Half to two-thirds of the children that they’re going to take care of already have private insurance,” Mr. Giuliani said. “They’re going to move them to the government. It is not just a beginning, it’s a big step in the direction of government-controlled medicine.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Now, poor Giuliani is a bit of a buffoon, so his nonsensical position isn’t too<\/i> big a surprise, but we’re talking about a policy in which 72% of Americans, not to mention a significant percentage of congressional Republicans, believe Bush is wrong. Does Frudy McRomney really see a benefit in endorsing the president’s biggest domestic policy blunder of the year? “…I’m more than willing to work with members of both parties from both Houses, and if they need a little more money in the bill to help us meet the objective of getting help for poor children, I’m more than willing to sit down with the leaders and find a way to do so.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n What Bush may or may not understand is that the current, bipartisan S-CHIP bill is already<\/i> a compromise measure. It’s exactly why it passed with such a strong majority.<\/p>\n
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\nFor what it’s worth, the president, after vetoing S-CHIP, said<\/a> he’s now open to compromise.<\/p>\n