Irregular Times Diaries: Unfit Discussion

I caught this when I came online today and it got me to grin a bit.

[b]Dems: Override children’s health veto[/b]
By MARY CLARE JALONICK, Associated Press Writer
1 hour, 51 minutes ago

Democratic Sen. Max Baucus of Montana asked his colleagues on Saturday to override President Bush’s veto of legislation that would expand a popular children’s health insurance program.

“Every Republican must decide whether they will stand with the president and his veto, or stand with our children and their right to a healthy future,” Baucus said in his party’s weekly radio address.

House Democrats have scheduled for this week a vote to override the president’s veto of legislation that would increase spending for the State Children’s Health Insurance Program by $35 billion over five years. Bush has called for a $5 billion increase.

The effort is not expected to succeed. An override requires a two-thirds majority in the House and Senate, and the earlier House vote fell about two dozen votes short. The Senate approved the increase by a veto-proof margin.

The program provides health insurance to children in families with incomes too great for Medicaid eligibility but not enough to afford private insurance. Bush has said the bill is too costly, goes beyond the program’s original intent and shifts too much insurance burden onto the government rather than private providers.

Baucus, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, said Tuesday that Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt had called him seeking to compromise on the bill, but he refused.

“We want to prevail,” Baucus said then.

He said Saturday that the president is telling millions of parents that they don’t deserve the same basic care for their kids that Bush had for his.

Are the Democrats finally growing a spine? Maybe not, but I still hope they can override this veto.

October 13, 2007 – Saturday

1658 days into the war

U.S. MILITARY DEATHS IN IRAQ: 3823
U.S. MILITARY WOUNDED IN IRAQ: 28171

IRAQI CIVILIAN DEATHS
(MINIMUM): 74983
(MAXIMUM): 81710
(LANCET ESTIMATE) 600,000

COST OF THE WAR SO FAR (ROUNDED TO THE NEAREST MILLION): $459,548,000,000

Please note that the above figures, from the IBC website, are NOT estimates of total Iraqi civilians killed as a result of the US invasion and its aftermath. Rather, they are a count of Western-reported verifiable violent deaths, and likely to be a small percentage of the true figure. Les Roberts, author of the Lancet Report, believes the actual number may now be as high as 1,000,000.

RED DAVE