More Evidence of Bush Administration Leaving Children Behind!
Yet another travesty from the Bush administration... "some 200,000 low-income children will be at risk of losing health coverage in the next three years. "
Children Left Behind
Friday, November 19, 2004
DEFICIT SPENDING didn't bother the Bush administration when the issue was tax cuts. Congress had no trouble finding "savings" to supposedly offset new costs when the costs were in a corporate tax bill stuffed with special-interest provisions. But when it comes to health care for poor children, different, stricter rules seem to apply. This week's lame-duck Congress is poised to leave town without taking any action to restore $1 billion in federal funding for children's health care that wasn't used before its Sept. 30 expiration and therefore reverted to the Treasury. Republican lawmakers say they don't oppose renewing the funding but insist that it has to be paid for with cuts elsewhere. The result is that some 200,000 low-income children will be at risk of losing health coverage in the next three years.
The issue involves the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), which was launched in 1997 to help states provide coverage to low-income children whose families earn too much to be eligible for Medicaid. With $40 billion in federal matching funds over 10 years, this was the largest expansion of health coverage for children since the adoption of Medicaid in the 1960s; last year alone the program enrolled 5.8 million children. Even as the share of Americans without health insurance is growing, the percentage of children lacking coverage has stayed stable, in large part thanks to Medicaid and SCHIP.
But under SCHIP's complicated use-it-or-lose-it formula, unspent money is going back to the Treasury just as some states are starting to run out of money -- money they need not to expand coverage but to keep serving the children who already have it. Between now and 2007, 18 states (including Maryland) are projected to have insufficient federal funding, which would require them to drop some children or find money elsewhere.
"America's children must have a healthy start in life," President Bush declared in accepting the Republican nomination in September. "In a new term, we will lead an aggressive effort to enroll millions of poor children who are eligible but not signed up for the government's health insurance programs. We will not allow a lack of attention, or information, to stand between these children and the health care they need." Stirring rhetoric, but what's the point of providing information and then failing to provide money? It's a dubious sort of fiscal responsibility that only kicks in when poor children's health is at stake.
It's time for Bush to put some money where his mouth is! The underpriveleged children of America are suffering while Bush & Co drive the deficit higher. Maybe it's just me... but I fail to see where the values are in the "value" party that gives to the rich while taking from the poor!
Children Left Behind
Friday, November 19, 2004
DEFICIT SPENDING didn't bother the Bush administration when the issue was tax cuts. Congress had no trouble finding "savings" to supposedly offset new costs when the costs were in a corporate tax bill stuffed with special-interest provisions. But when it comes to health care for poor children, different, stricter rules seem to apply. This week's lame-duck Congress is poised to leave town without taking any action to restore $1 billion in federal funding for children's health care that wasn't used before its Sept. 30 expiration and therefore reverted to the Treasury. Republican lawmakers say they don't oppose renewing the funding but insist that it has to be paid for with cuts elsewhere. The result is that some 200,000 low-income children will be at risk of losing health coverage in the next three years.
The issue involves the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), which was launched in 1997 to help states provide coverage to low-income children whose families earn too much to be eligible for Medicaid. With $40 billion in federal matching funds over 10 years, this was the largest expansion of health coverage for children since the adoption of Medicaid in the 1960s; last year alone the program enrolled 5.8 million children. Even as the share of Americans without health insurance is growing, the percentage of children lacking coverage has stayed stable, in large part thanks to Medicaid and SCHIP.
But under SCHIP's complicated use-it-or-lose-it formula, unspent money is going back to the Treasury just as some states are starting to run out of money -- money they need not to expand coverage but to keep serving the children who already have it. Between now and 2007, 18 states (including Maryland) are projected to have insufficient federal funding, which would require them to drop some children or find money elsewhere.
"America's children must have a healthy start in life," President Bush declared in accepting the Republican nomination in September. "In a new term, we will lead an aggressive effort to enroll millions of poor children who are eligible but not signed up for the government's health insurance programs. We will not allow a lack of attention, or information, to stand between these children and the health care they need." Stirring rhetoric, but what's the point of providing information and then failing to provide money? It's a dubious sort of fiscal responsibility that only kicks in when poor children's health is at stake.
It's time for Bush to put some money where his mouth is! The underpriveleged children of America are suffering while Bush & Co drive the deficit higher. Maybe it's just me... but I fail to see where the values are in the "value" party that gives to the rich while taking from the poor!
posted by Pamela J. Leavey at 11:48 PM
2 Comments:
Caring for Those Left Behind
Soldiers' survivors need real benefits more than yellow ribbons.
By Frank Schaeffer
Friday, November 19, 2004; Page A29
Marine Staff Sgt. Aaron White was killed in a helicopter crash on May 19, 2003, in Iraq. Here is an excerpt from his last letter home to his wife, Michele, and his baby daughter, Brianna.
"What keeps me up at night is thinking you may never know what you mean to me. . . . If I don't come home, please tell Brianna that her daddy loves her more than life. . . . Brianna, it breaks my heart to have to miss your first birthday. I hope that you will forgive me. . . . I fall asleep every night with visions of you and your mommy in my head, reminding me of all I have been blessed with. I will be with you every day, if not in body, then in spirit. I love you more than my words could ever say."
Aaron was killed two days after Brianna turned 1. When an American in a military uniform is killed his or her family receives a one-time death gratuity of $12,000. The surviving family may also qualify for the Survivor Benefit Plan (SBP), which is paid up to age 62 or until the spouse remarries. The SBP benefit amounts to 55 percent of the soldier's retirement pay, pay that is already so low it qualifies many military families for food stamps.
These "benefits" are contingent on fulfilling many petty regulations. Michele did not qualify for the SBP because Aaron was in the Marine Corps just under 10 years. Several further benefits, such as the income-based Dependency and Indemnity Compensation (DIC), may pay out about $800 per month and $200 per child, depending on the case. Michele did not qualify because of several arcane technicalities. Michele and Brianna's medical benefits will end three years from the date of Aaron's death. But Michele did receive some modest insurance compensation, because Aaron paid for coverage out of his meager salary.
A just-released study by the Rand Corp. found that the families of civilians killed in the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, received on average $3.1 million in government and charitable compensation. The families of the firefighters and cops who died received even more; their average compensation was $4.2 million.
Our soldiers are being killed on a daily basis, but most of us seem to feel little personal connection with them. If we did, their widows and families would be better compensated. Our idea of "supporting the troops" is to stick magnetic yellow ribbons on our cars. Those Americans who do not serve or do not have family serving are disconnected from our all-volunteer forces and their families.
I know. I never served in the military, and before my son unexpectedly enlisted in the Marines, and then went to war in the Middle East for 11 months, I looked at our military as made up of people who had little to do with me.
Let's strip away our yellow-ribbon sentimentality for a moment and admit the truth: We treat our military like second-class citizens. I'm glad the Sept. 11 families were generously compensated, but it's time to ask why the family of someone who has done no more for his country than show up at a stock trading office on the wrong day should receive hundreds of times as much compensation as the family of a soldier who volunteered to leave his wife and child to defend the rest of us.
Most of the dead from our wars in Afghanistan and Iraq are being buried in small towns and in the blue-collar or middle- and lower-middle-class sections of our cities. Our politicians seem better able to identify with the needs of stock traders' widows (not to mention the businesses and airlines that were also generously compensated) than with the needs of the families of our soldiers. This is a scandal.
In his second-to-last letter home Aaron wrote: "Believe me I am not having a good time here. This is an ugly hasty land. I hope [our] people appreciate the blood we are to spill." Judging by how we are taking care of his widow and daughter, apparently the answer is that we do not.
The writer's latest book is "Voices From the Front: Letters Home From America's Military Family," and he can be contacted at www.frankschaeffer.com.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A61375-2004Nov18.html
Obviously the families of those killed in action suffer more, but also keep in mind that many families of those living and serving in Iraq also have financial hardship. We are not talking about young kids out of school. Many of them are well established in jobs and supporting families, but not are receiving much less in pay than they previously earned. The son of one of my employees was just shipped off to Iraq. Before going his group was advised to take out loans as it would be a few months before they saw a pay check (wihich would be much smaller than he usually earns).
To also comment on the main post, here's a major difference between Kerry and Bush in the White House. Under Kerry all children would be covered. Under Bush a growing number will go without coverage.
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