Rocking the SCHIP Vote
While I still feel that Graves’ election year blood lust on the illegal immigration problem is out of proportion with the perceived negative effects we are receiving from their presence in Parkville and southern Platte County, the congressman has put me squarely in his corner on voting against the expansion of SCHIP – and not for the reasons you may believe.
There are plenty of good reasons to vote for the expansion of SCHIP –for instance, one year of the expansion would equal about one month of the spending we do in Iraq right now, and it would insure 10 million kids in need of healthcare. For many congressional districts, the expansion makes sense and it can be implemented without much duress. Also, as a Roosevelt Republican (Teddy, not Frank), I’m for less government, but there are certain times I want my government to step in control the activities affecting my life. Insuring working adults? Not so much. Insuring kids of families struggling to make it in this plasma-television society? Yes. Stroke the check.
And there are plenty points of Graves’ argument that I don’t agree with. For instance, he ridicules New York City residents making around $83,000 that would be eligible for the plan, stating that it’s 400 percent higher than the poverty level. I know this sounds weird, but trust me…$83,000 is poor in Manhattan. That’s just how it works out.
Further, I don’t favor voting against our kids because a few illegal immigrants’ kids may receive coverage. It may sound fine and good for all of the pro-life/pro-death penalty Republicans to sound off against the little brown kids from Iztapalapa stealing our aspirin, but show me one of them that would truly deny a child care should one of them come crawling in pain to their hunting cabin at night.
That’s where the Democrats strike out completely. This is a true political issue and not the issue of compassion they are trying to serve us and their liberal media pawns with a spoonful of sugar. It might make great copy for The Kansas City Star when they portray Graves as an evil Klingon from the planet Tarkio voting to kill children, but take a closer look.
First off, Graves is not voting to kill SCHIP — he’s voting against expanding it. The SCHIP expansion proposes to pay for itself by instituting a 61 cent increase in tobacco taxes. Studies show that in order to actually fund this bill for another ten years, we need 22 million new smokers to generate enough tax. And it’s mandatory funding, meaning that if we don’t convince enough people to start smoking, Congress will have to raise taxes again.
Kay Barnes’ attack on Graves (and you can see it for yourself in it’s entirety at kay4congress,com) was a weak one, all considered. Instead of telling us why we needed to pass this bill, she smeared Graves, essentially saying that he wasn’t going along with all the other people, and that he wouldn’t have voted for Medicare in the ‘60s. She may infer that from his arguments, but it is clearly the less substantive of the two.
Nonetheless, the fighting and the rhetoric will go on, and the voters will be mislead throughout the campaigns. That’s the way District 6 candidates want it, and that’s the way it is.