LIVID ABOUT BUSH VETO ON CHILDREN'S HEALTHCARE BILL

Here's the run down on the bill, which passed in a bipartisan effort in the House 265-159 and the Senate 67-29. Bush has vetoed, citing a desire to keep government out of healthcare. You know what I think? I think Dubya's got an obligation to veto, since expanding coverage would be paid for by a $0.61 tobacco tax increase. Yeah, forget that more people quit the higher the price goes, forget that we'd be taking money from smokers to pay for kids to have access to health insurance. Let's protect the interests of TABACCO.

FIFTEEN more Republican votes need to be drummed up in the House by October 18 to overturn Bush's veto. In MN, the only elected officials to vote nea in either the house or the senate were Kline and Bachmann. I have a call in to Bachmann's office to find out what the hell she was thinking. She has 5 children. Are they on healthcare I pay for?

Look up your representatives here: http://www.visi.com/juan/congress/index.html
Look up how they voted here: http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2007/roll906.xml
Look up the history of the bill here: http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h110-976


From: http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h110-976&tab=summary

"H.R. 976: Children's Health Insurance Program Reauthorization Act of 2007
An act to amend title XXI of the Social Security Act to extend and improve the Children's Health Insurance Program, and for other purposes.

The following is Project Vote Smart's highlights for this bill, graciously made available by PVS:

Appropriates $9.13 billion for fiscal year 2008, $10.68 billion for fiscal year 2009, $11.85 billion for fiscal year 2010, and $13.75 billion for fiscal year 2011 for the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) [Title I (Sec. 101)].

-Creates an incentive pool for states whose CHIP enrollment numbers exceed baseline projections [Title I (Sec. 105)].

-Prohibits the issuance of CHIP waivers to non-pregnant childless adults after passage, and terminates existing waivers on September 30, 2008 [Title I (Sec. 106)].

-Allows a state to apply for Medicaid waivers to continue coverage for non-pregnant childless adults whose waivers have been terminated [Title I (Sec. 106)].

-Allows states to continue providing child health assistance to parents of eligible children under an existing waiver through 2012 and provides additional funding for states meeting certain outreach and coverage benchmarks [Title I (Sec. 106)].

-Allows states to change their child health plans to provide pregnancy-related assistance to targeted low-income pregnant women if they have a Medicaid eligibility level for pregnant women that is at least 185 percent above the poverty level, among other requirements [Title I (Sec. 107)].

-Establishes a CHIP Contingency Fund to eliminate the Federal share of shortfalls in state CHIP allotments [Title I (Sec. 108)].

-Appropriates $100 million for grants to eligible private or public entities to conduct outreach efforts designed to increase CHIP enrollment among eligible children and sets aside 10 percent of the allocated money for the administration of a national CHIP enrollment campaign [Title II (Sec. 201)].

-Allows states to offer subsidies for qualified employer-sponsored group health coverage to all targeted low-income children who are eligible, if such coverage is more cost-effective than enrollment in the State child health plan [Title IV (Sec. 401)].

-Requires the publication of a recommended core set of child health quality measures, including full insurance coverage and the availability of a full range of services and treatment, for use by state CHIP programs by January 1, 2009 [Title V (Sec. 501)].

-Increases the tax on cigars from $1.828 per thousand to $50.00 per thousand for cigars weighing less than 3 pounds per thousand, and increases the tax from 20.719 percent of the retail price to 53.13 percent of the retail price for cigars weighing more than three pounds per thousand, with a cap of $3.00 per cigar [Title VII (Sec. 701 [a])].

-Increases the tax from $19.50 per thousand to $50.00 per thousand for cigarettes weighing less than 3 pounds per thousand, and increases the tax from $40.95 per thousand to $104.9999 per thousand for cigarettes weighing more than 3 pounds per thousand [Title VII (Sec. 701 [b])].

-Increases the taxes on cigarette paper from $0.122 to $0.313 per fifty papers and on cigarette tubes from $0.244 to $0.626 per fifty tubes [Title VII (Sec. 701 [c-d])].

-Increases the taxes on snuff from $0.585 to $1.50 per pound and on chewing tobacco from $0.195 to $0.50 per pound [Title VII (Sec. 701 [e])].

-Increases the taxes on pipe tobacco from $1.0969 to $2.8126 per pound and on roll-your-own-tobacco from $1.0969 to $8.8889 per pound [Title VII (Sec. 701 [f-g])].