Bush Endangers Children

www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/chi-oped1021pageoct21,1,630313.column

Commentary

Snatch victory from kids’ health bill defeat

Clarence Page
October 21, 2007
WASHINGTON

Some folks don’t believe government-run health care will work — even when it already is working.

Way back in the 1990s, then-Louisiana Sen. John Breaux was accosted in an airport by an elderly woman who pleaded, “Senator, don’t you dare let the government get its hands on my Medicare!”

To paraphrase Rick from “Casablanca,” she was misinformed.

Nevertheless, Breaux, always the gentleman, replied congenially, “Don’t worry, madam, I won’t.”

That’s a small illustration of how successful conservatives and the health insurance industry have been at demonizing anything that sounds like “government-run health care.”

How did President Bush hold off attempts by the Democrat-run House to override his veto of a popular children’s health-insurance bill? He called it a foot in the door to “government-run health care.”

He says that like it’s a bad thing. In fact, as the Breaux anecdote illustrates, the public has been very supportive of Medicare for the elderly, Medicaid for the poor and the State Children’s Health Insurance Program, or SCHIP, for children whose family income is too high for Medicaid but too low to afford private coverage. Nevertheless, the president and his allies are reduced to reminding people that, “Pssst, it’s government health care so you’re supposed to be afraid of it.”

Weigh in folks – George Bush; bully or realist?