SCHIP!

I don’t know how many times I can call Tim Murphy without being counterproductive… You would think that his background in child psych would trump the “R” next to his name.

Helloooooooo?

Do it for the kids…hi Christy!

musicsleuth @ 2

I don’t know how many times I can call Tim Murphy without being counterproductive… You would think that his background in child psych would trump the “R” next to his name.

How about the MD next to Tom Price’s (R-GA) name? The R comes before all else.

Man, I’m gong to have to update my cellphone plan, I need to get more minutes for these days ahead.

Elliott @ 6

Man, I’m gong to have to update my cellphone plan, I need to get more minutes for these days ahead.

V*nage for me - free long-distance.

Quick look up for Republican phone numbers on the list.

This is one we could win.

Recently the estimable Charles Grassley has
voiced his considerable disapproval of w.’s
ethically and factually challenged position.
It seems even the Republican governors have had a belly-full on this issue.

After so many Sisyphean efforts it would be nice to finally roll a boulder to the top of the damn hill.

Sen. Hatch - “Hey - don’t forget me! I’m over here - and I’m still a dick!”.

Leahy gives him the back of the hand.

On the advice of Harry Truman, I’ve given Joe Donnelly hell on this issue in the past, and I’ll give him a call about this in just a few minutes.

I think he may be persuadable on this.

We might also point out that this issue is a win-win for congress. They are currently at an 11 percent approval rating, and taking a stand on this issue will certainly improve their public perception…

More from NPR this morning as well.

Elliott @ 6

Man, I’m gong to have to update my cellphone plan, I need to get more minutes for these days ahead.

Get a Working Assets Cell phone. They throw in free calls to your congresscritters. AND they give to progressive causes.

I’ve been using them for a year now. Works just fine!

Taking care of sick kids ~

Talk about your family values? Even the Republicans ought to get this one. And if they don’t, tell them it actually saves money.

I just phoned Cong. Etheridge, McIntyre and Schuler. I’m fortunate that Brad Miller is my representative. I encouraged all to support the children’s health legislation. In each office the person I spoke to in each office said that calls were split.

RevDeb @ 14

Elliott @ 6

Man, I’m gong to have to update my cellphone plan, I need to get more minutes for these days ahead.

Get a Working Assets Cell phone. They throw in free calls to your congresscritters. AND they give to progressive causes.

I’ve been using them for a year now. Works just fine!

Thanks
I’m a big fan of Working Assets for years but I didn’t realize I could do my phone through them. Thanks!

Can someone please make Dana Perino, or one of those WH spokespeople, explain again how presenting Bush with legislation that he vetoes means that Congress is being ineffective?

OT - sorry…

MSNBC caption of GWB at the U.N.:

“Pres Bush: Best Way to Lift People out of Poverty is Trade and Investment.”

ok - so if people living below poverty level would just spend more time with their brokers, we’d all be better off, right?

Concerned at 19 — Please don’t blogwhore links to just your own blog. And don’t think that anyone is falling for your Heritage Foundation corporate shilling, either. Just so you know…

Heard some reporting this morning on NPR about SCHIP. This is a great issue for the Dems. Doing the right thing and good politics. They should keep it in the news even beyond this week. All the opponents sounded like Potter the banker from “It’s A Wonderful Life.”

jayt at 20 — Yes, if only all the poor people could take their non-existent extra cash from their three part-time jobs and put it into a health savings account, things would be peachy. Ahem.

Christy Hardin Smith @ 23

jayt at 20 — Yes, if only all the poor people could take their non-existent extra cash from their three part-time jobs and put it into a health savings account, things would be peachy. Ahem.

Come on. The facts about trickle down economics speak for themselves. They don’t work. But I don’t think that’s what Bush means.

jayt @ 19

OT - sorry…

MSNBC caption of GWB at the U.N.:

“Pres Bush: Best Way to Lift People out of Poverty is Trade and Investment.”

ok - so if people living below poverty level would just spend more time with their brokers, we’d all be better off, right?

George - trade and investment only works to people’s benefit when a) the investment in jobs takes place here in the US and the jobs are here in the US and b)when healthcare if affordable for everyone. Fastest route to bankruptcy and poverty is having a medical crisis. Even with insurance coverage - most people can NOT afford to pay the out of pocket costs - the healthcare itself is unaffordable.

poor American kids have never had it so good.

just name one ’swimmin’ hole’ that’s filled with dead Iraquis.

I knew you couldn’t.

jim oconnor @ 21

Heard some reporting this morning on NPR about SCHIP. This is a great issue for the Dems. Doing the right thing and good politics. They should keep it in the news even beyond this week. All the opponents sounded like Potter the banker from “It’s A Wonderful Life.”

I’ll say it again - this is one of those cases where “doing the right” thing is also “doing the smart thing”. Healthcare for children costs little on a per kid basis - and pays big dividends later not only in increased health and productivity as adults, but also in major, huge savings in terms of avoiding the costs of the “big stuff” as adults. It’s a win/win for everyone. Even if you HATE kids and are a complete economics nutcase, you have to admit that avoiding costs is a good thing.

Mabel at 26 — You ever dealt with a child who had to leave in squalor, who didn’t know when they were going to see their next meal, who had a chronic untreated health condition and was being sexually abused on a regular basis and could not stop it or get another adult to care enough to do so? I have. And worse. And the sort of snark that diminishes one desperate child’s needs for another is misplaced — there is no child on this planet that deserves shitty treatment. Period.

And it isn’t an either/or question.

Hatch painting the warrantless wiretapping activities of AT&T, et al, as being “patriotic” - right, Mr. McConeell?

McC: Yup - 9-11.

Already called Don Young (R-dead animals) about this, and it appears he wants to vote for SCHIP because he hopes to not completely lose the Native Alaskan vote like he deserves. But something tells me that he’ll vote the way the WH team tell him to on this, or is counting on being bailed out when the veto override issue comes up in the Senate. Either way, he feels the breath of the voters on his coyote hyena pelt…

Had the distinct displeasure of defending Pat Buchanan here last night. Sheesh!

Speaking of Rep. Don Young, this picture of dead animals on his office wall reminds me of this song by Shriekback.

Hatch:
if we don’t make this permanent we are all going to die.

Elliott @ 31

Hatch:
if we don’t make this permanent we are all going to die.

possibly tonight

ET — I missed the Buchanan defense — what for, pray tell? *g*

Elliott @ 31

Hatch:
if we don’t make this permanent we are all going to die.

the lawyer in me just cringes every time Hatch opens his mouth. His “questions” consist of Hatch leading the witness and testifying himself.

You’d think that the Judiciary Committee might take some notice of the rules of Evidence.

Ahem:

Administration officials said they were concerned that the White House was being hurt by televised news reports that portrayed the fight as a struggle between Mr. Bush and poor children, rather than as a philosophical debate over the role of government in health care.

What else is the fight about then?

Just called Cong. Mollohan’s office — he’s voted for SCHIP in the past, but thought an extra nudge to let him know we’re watching was a good thing.

LINK to my 35

jayt at 34 — I know — I want to object every time he opens his mouth. *G* It is so blantantly leading and so poorly done, at that. Blergh.

Anyone getting responses back from any of the folks on the target list? If so, I’d love to know what they are. Cong. Mollohan’s office hadn’t gotten many calls — am wondering how other offices seem to be faring?

Christy Hardin Smith @ 32

ET — I missed the Buchanan defense — what for, pray tell? *g*

Read the ensuing debate, uh dialogue, uh hassle at your own risk…

Ed*ard Teller @ 29

Already called Don Young (R-dead animals) about this, and it appears he wants to vote for SCHIP because he hopes to not completely lose the Native Alaskan vote like he deserves. But something tells me that he’ll vote the way the WH team tell him to on this, or is counting on being bailed out when the veto override issue comes up in the Senate. Either way, he feels the breath of the voters on his coyote hyena pelt…

Had the distinct displeasure of defending Pat Buchanan here last night. Sheesh!

Speaking of Rep. Don Young, this picture of dead animals on his office wall reminds me of this song by Shriekback.

ET bringing the heat! Young’s running scared, between investigations and having a real opponent in Diane Benson for ‘08.

btw Christy, I was just rereading up top and found myself mesmerized by the little hand. What an expressive portrait!

Isn’t the proposal to fund this entirely through an increase in federal cigarette taxes???

Elliott at 41 — I know — I loved that shot. Reminds me of when The Peanut was tiny, and I used to be mesmerized by how beautiful her little fingers were, curling around my own as she slept on top of my chest while we sat on the couch. SIGH I miss the tiny days, although I have to say the more expressive older days are pretty fun as well. ;-)

Please point them to the ACE Study (Adverse Childhood Experiences) by the CDC which is one of the largest studies ever conducted on the link between maltreatment as a child and illness later in life.
They even have visual aids.

Anything we can do to help give our children a leg up pays dividends for a generation. Reducing SCHIP does the opposite.

Here’s some additional ammunition when calling:

Number of Uninsured and Low-Income Uninsured Children By State [PDF alert] Tell the recalcitrant Reps just how many kids are uninsured (and how many of those are below 200% of poverty-level) in their state alone.

and from the Urban Institute 2/9/07: “[Researchers] Kenney and Cook also found that only 25 percent of SCHIP enrollees live in families with access to employer-sponsored insurance (ESI), far below the 40 percent figure assumed by the Congressional Budget Office in 1997. Two-thirds of SCHIP enrollees live in families where neither parent has ESI coverage, and three-quarters are in families in which at least one parent is not covered by ESI.” [my bold]

Whoever wrote Bush’s speech to the UN General Assembly did a nice job. I just wish I had some reason to believe that Bush either (a) understands what he read or (b) has even a glimmer of a commitment to any of it.

Oh, and what’s that herd of elephants doing over there in the corner?

Christy Hardin Smith @ 43

Elliott at 41 — I know — I loved that shot. Reminds me of when The Peanut was tiny, and I used to be mesmerized by how beautiful her little fingers were, curling around my own as she slept on top of my chest while we sat on the couch. SIGH I miss the tiny days, although I have to say the more expressive older days are pretty fun as well. ;-)

*S*

MoveOn has been very helpful in mobilizing people to call their Congresscritters on SCHIP. I got an email yesterday morning, complete with an embedded link to my guy’s DC office phone number. Made it really easy to make the call from my cell while sitting in traffic on the way in to the office.

Wish I had some reason to believe that Ed Royce was paying attention …

the only advertisements to run in the moron capital of the world is to continue to run commercials that even the dumbest cretin can understand
who is voting to kill their right for them or their children’s free health care. They have given enough bribes to Iraqi puppets that have been pocketed than it would have cost for 4 years of health care for every American.

does anyone have reason to believe this won’t get enough votes to make health care pass, and the candidates that swear they will vote to support it. Not once, but until it passes, no surrender.

I am sick of watching a retarded president make nice with the demo front runner. Decorum is a sickening thing because it shows complicity and conspiracy.

[Mod: Please don’t use retarded in this way. We have a lot of readers with special needs kids, and this is hurtful to them, thanks.]

I spent last week talking to Dean Heller’s office. Nice aide and I hope something within Heller registers this is about all children. They count on adults to do the right thing by them because they have no voice or means to organize among themselves.

It isn’t just a heart tug poor kids issue, they ARE the most vulnerable in our society. For eight years I taught in the most impoverished part of Oakland and seeing what my children went through, personally, I would rather have died the first six months of my life than face such a miserable daily existence. It’s beyond blaming parents. The kids need adult advocates. The least among us…..

This morning, Heller gets another reminder call. I talk to them as a witness to children’s health needs.

George W. Bush’s vision for America;

matewan.squarespace.com link

egregious @ 40

Ed*ard Teller @ 29

Already called Don Young (R-dead animals) about this, and it appears he wants to vote for SCHIP because he hopes to not completely lose the Native Alaskan vote like he deserves. But something tells me that he’ll vote the way the WH team tell him to on this, or is counting on being bailed out when the veto override issue comes up in the Senate. Either way, he feels the breath of the voters on his coyote hyena pelt…

Had the distinct displeasure of defending Pat Buchanan here last night. Sheesh!

Speaking of Rep. Don Young, this picture of dead animals on his office wall reminds me of this song by Shriekback.

ET bringing the heat! Young’s running scared, between investigations and having a real opponent in Diane Benson for ‘08.

I found out yesterday, volunteering for some people doing research on campaign financing in Alaska, and melding in new information coming out of Pete Kott’s GOP-VECO corruption trial, that if you remove VECO contributions to GOP pols in Alaska legislative races, Dems raise more money here than do the Repukes. With your help, I must add…

There should be a jury verdict - predicted overwhelmingly to be “guilty” - in the former Rep. Pete Kott GOP corruption trial in Anchorage today. So much negative information came out on the stand about FBI and DOJ interest in Ted Stevens and his son Ben, that it is widely speculated that the Feds will announce their indictments shortly.

This from the WaPo
about Sen. Grassley: Bush should put children’s health first.

A senior Senate Republican accused President Bush yesterday of holding a bipartisan expansion of the popular State Children’s Health Insurance Program hostage to his broader policy goals of using tax deductions to help people afford private health insurance coverage.

Just occurred to me, this is the same president who cut short his vacation to fly to DC and sign the Schiavo bill.
Children Matter!

Correspondance from HoJoe.September 24, 2007

Thank you for contacting me to express your support for longer leave for troops serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. I appreciate your views on this issue, and I welcome the opportunity to respond.
As you may know, Senator Jim Webb (D-VA) introduced an amendment (S.Amdt. 2909) to the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2008 (H.R. 1585) that would specify minimum periods between deployment of units and members of the Armed Forces deployed for Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom. This amendment failed by a vote of 56 to 44, with 60 votes needed for further consideration of the amendment, on September 19, 2007.
I support the U.S. Department of Defense’s goal of providing active duty soldiers an equal amount of time at home for the time they are deployed and providing Guard and Reserve members as much as three times the amount of time at home for time spent deployed. I would like to see that happen and as soon as possible. However, serving as a de facto troop withdrawal, S.Amdt. 2909 would have constrained the flexibility of our armed services and limited the ability of our commanders on the ground to conduct operations. We should not limit the authorities of our generals with such statutes. Those on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan know best the number of troops they need to get the job done.
As a senior member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, please be assured of my strong commitment to ensuring that our military remains the strongest in the world.

Seriously? Is that what the Webb amendment was to the Repugs. A de facto troop withdrawal?

I called Jim Ramstad’s DC office. Ramstad is in MN-03 and not my critter. The staff member asked for my address and said I was not one of his constituents. Ahem. (My own critter, Keith Ellison, MN-05, is not on the list of people to call.)

mui @ 54

Correspondance from HoJoe.September 24, 2007

Thank you for contacting me to express your support for longer leave for troops serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. I appreciate your views on this issue, and I welcome the opportunity to respond.
As you may know, Senator Jim Webb (D-VA) introduced an amendment (S.Amdt. 2909) to the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2008 (H.R. 1585) that would specify minimum periods between deployment of units and members of the Armed Forces deployed for Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom. This amendment failed by a vote of 56 to 44, with 60 votes needed for further consideration of the amendment, on September 19, 2007.
I support the U.S. Department of Defense’s goal of providing active duty soldiers an equal amount of time at home for the time they are deployed and providing Guard and Reserve members as much as three times the amount of time at home for time spent deployed. I would like to see that happen and as soon as possible. However, serving as a de facto troop withdrawal, S.Amdt. 2909 would have constrained the flexibility of our armed services and limited the ability of our commanders on the ground to conduct operations. We should not limit the authorities of our generals with such statutes. Those on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan know best the number of troops they need to get the job done.
As a senior member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, please be assured of my strong commitment to ensuring that our military remains the strongest in the world.

Seriously? Is that what the Webb amendment was to the Repugs. A de facto troop withdrawal?

Yep - they viewed it as a “backdoor” method of getting withdrawals without calling them withdrawals…

Cozumel @ 42

Isn’t the proposal to fund this entirely through an increase in federal cigarette taxes???

Yes, as the following implies:

Daniel E. Smith, vice president of the American Cancer Society, said: “The choice is simple: Are you for kids? Are you for tobacco companies? Mr. President and Congress, we hope you side with the kids.”

Ed*ard Teller @ 52

egregious @ 40

ET bringing the heat! Young’s running scared, between investigations and having a real opponent in Diane Benson for ‘08.

I found out yesterday, volunteering for some people doing research on campaign financing in Alaska, and melding in new information coming out of Pete Kott’s GOP-VECO corruption trial, that if you remove VECO contributions to GOP pols in Alaska legislative races, Dems raise more money here than do the Repukes. With your help, I must add…

There should be a jury verdict - predicted overwhelmingly to be “guilty” - in the former Rep. Pete Kott GOP corruption trial in Anchorage today. So much negative information came out on the stand about FBI and DOJ interest in Ted Stevens and his son Ben, that it is widely speculated that the Feds will announce their indictments shortly.

Federal indictments…mmmmm…

Biodun @ 55

I called Jim Ramstad’s DC office. Ramstad is in MN-03 and not my critter. The staff member asked for my address and said I was not one of his constituents. Ahem. (My own critter, Keith Ellison, MN-05, is not on the list of people to call.)

Ramstad is free to vote his conscience. Hope he has one.

mui @ 54

Correspondance from HoJoe.September 24, 2007

Thank you for contacting me to express your support for longer leave for troops serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. I appreciate your views on this issue, and I welcome the opportunity to respond.
As you may know, Senator Jim Webb (D-VA) introduced an amendment (S.Amdt. 2909) to the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2008 (H.R. 1585) that would specify minimum periods between deployment of units and members of the Armed Forces deployed for Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom. This amendment failed by a vote of 56 to 44, with 60 votes needed for further consideration of the amendment, on September 19, 2007.
I support the U.S. Department of Defense’s goal of providing active duty soldiers an equal amount of time at home for the time they are deployed and providing Guard and Reserve members as much as three times the amount of time at home for time spent deployed. I would like to see that happen and as soon as possible. However, serving as a de facto troop withdrawal, S.Amdt. 2909 would have constrained the flexibility of our armed services and limited the ability of our commanders on the ground to conduct operations. We should not limit the authorities of our generals with such statutes. Those on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan know best the number of troops they need to get the job done.
As a senior member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, please be assured of my strong commitment to ensuring that our military remains the strongest in the world.

Seriously? Is that what the Webb amendment was to the Repugs. A de facto troop withdrawal?

Yup. That’s why Bush’s neo-cons never ever considered voting ‘aye’.

Christy Hardin Smith @ 27

Mabel at 26 — You ever dealt with a child who had to leave in squalor, who didn’t know when they were going to see their next meal, who had a chronic untreated health condition and was being sexually abused on a regular basis and could not stop it or get another adult to care enough to do so? I have. And worse. And the sort of snark that diminishes one desperate child’s needs for another is misplaced — there is no child on this planet that deserves shitty treatment. Period.

And it isn’t an either/or question.

Period

Biodun @ 57

Cozumel @ 42

Isn’t the proposal to fund this entirely through an increase in federal cigarette taxes???

Yes, as the following implies:

Daniel E. Smith, vice president of the American Cancer Society, said: “The choice is simple: Are you for kids? Are you for tobacco companies? Mr. President and Congress, we hope you side with the kids.”

ohhhh, i like that ultimatum!

AFL-CIO also has a petition. For SCHIP.

Sen. Ted Stevens makes New Yorker’s “Talk of the Town…” Turns out his boat is moored on the same float at the Capital Yacht Club on the Potomac as Duke Cunningham and Larry Craig’s boats. The Yacht Club now refers to “D” Float, where Stevens’s 38-foot Chris Craft Cw S Way is tied up, as “Dummy” Dock:

“Are all these politicians even good for us?” one club member asked last week. “We used to think they were great. They could lobby on our behalf. Now it’s spinning the opposite way.” In the past two years, thanks to the men of D Dock, club members have been subpoenaed to testify before a grand jury, they have witnessed federal agents on a raid, and they have grown used to reporters gathering like gulls on the sea wall. “We’re all wondering if there’s something in the water,” one member said. “Or maybe the ‘D’ stands for ‘dummy.’

GeorgeSimian @ 23

Christy Hardin Smith @ 23

jayt at 20 — Yes, if only all the poor people could take their non-existent extra cash from their three part-time jobs and put it into a health savings account, things would be peachy. Ahem.

Come on. The facts about trickle down economics speak for themselves. They don’t work. But I don’t think that’s what Bush means.

“trickle down” basically means piss on them.

kdh22 @ 60

mui @ 54

Correspondance from HoJoe.September 24, 2007
Seriously? Is that what the Webb amendment was to the Repugs. A de facto troop withdrawal?

Yup. That’s why Bush’s neo-cons never ever considered voting ‘aye’.

What a bunch of paranoid losers they are.

Biodun @ 57

Cozumel @ 42

Isn’t the proposal to fund this entirely through an increase in federal cigarette taxes???

Yes, as the following implies:

Daniel E. Smith, vice president of the American Cancer Society, said: “The choice is simple: Are you for kids? Are you for tobacco companies? Mr. President and Congress, we hope you side with the kids.”

That’s what I thought, yet another bullsh*t sin tax. And that’s on the consumer, NOT the tobacco companies by the way.

I fear my head is going to explode if Boosh stands before the cameras even one more time to demand billions for waging war, and in the same sentence, vows to veto health care for children.
The man has no heart, no brain, no soul - all apparently pickled during his own endless childhood.

SHAME on him! Without his own personal safety net, he wouldn’t even be on this earth by now.

I will contact Ralph Regula. If he votes agnst sChip, he is being disingenuous beyond my tolerance level.

He pretends to support education and valuable arts outreach programs to local schools - but neither being anywhere nearly as helpful as they should, in the absence of health care.

The children deserve the whole package, nothing less.

Cozumel @ 68

Biodun @ 57

Yes, as the following implies:

That’s what I thought, yet another bullsh*t sin tax. And that’s on the consumer, NOT the tobacco companies by the way.

Stop smoking.

And which groups might we be missing?

On Monday, a wide range of groups endorsed the compromise bill, saying it should be passed by Congress and signed by Mr. Bush. The groups included the American Medical Association, the American Hospital Association, America’s Health Insurance Plans and the Healthcare Leadership Council, representing insurers, hospitals, pharmacies and pharmaceutical companies.

(Same link as in my 57.)

A fly-by quickie about HSAs. Let’s suppose your company offers one, and you scrimp to participate, and you have a child with serious expensive illness. You max out your deductible in the first month or so of the year and then have a whole year of anxiety, hoping you don’t get fired or the company doesn’t belly-up before your cash flow recoups that expensive deductible because of course your family with young kids is just like every middle American family that has $2500 or $5000 or whatever just layin’ around collecting dust modest interest in last year’s HSA account. Not.

Make those SCHIP calls! You know the Reperp big boys are callin’ threatening primary challenges. We the people need to drown ‘em out with our volume numbers.

Demand better. Be better.

A reminder, for those who might end up in a discussion with a Republican staffer about SCHIP: improving access to health care for the children of working-class Americans is pro-small business and pro-American competitiveness. Push all their buttons!

Mike Simpson’s office tells me that the bill hasn’t been released yet, so they don’t know what it says, so they don’t know the Representative’s position on it. Simpson “supports SCHIP” but she can’t tell me how he will vote on the legislation.

Her voice quavered as she had to respond to my incredulous replies to THAT steaming pile.

But she’ll pass along my urging his support.

Cozumel @ 67

Biodun @ 57

Yes, as the following implies:

That’s what I thought, yet another bullsh*t sin tax. And that’s on the consumer, NOT the tobacco companies by the way.

I don’t agree with sin taxes or taxing the consumer at all. But I support this bill. Taxing the consumer is like taxing the peasant before the French Revolution. Meanwhile the Feudal Lords are exempt.

Even if your congressperson isn’t on the list it’s still a good idea to call them and shore up their support - especially if they are in the Blue Dogs, or have strong ties to the tobacco industry, or if they are in the cong black caucus, which has been a little squishy in its support for the compromise (they wish it had gone further, but we need to impress on them that this is really our best chance to do something now)

Christy Hardin Smith @ 38

Anyone getting responses back from any of the folks on the target list? If so, I’d love to know what they are. Cong. Mollohan’s office hadn’t gotten many calls — am wondering how other offices seem to be faring?

Christy, Congresswoman Deborah Pryce is on the record in today’s Columbus Dispatch saying she will vote for SCHIP.

She voted against an earlier version (House?) because it had cuts to Medicare programs to get the necessary funding. AFAIK, the version they’re voting on today is the one passed by the Senate…and gets its funding from an increase in taxes on tobacco products…

JF @ 69

Cozumel @ 68

That’s what I thought, yet another bullsh*t sin tax. And that’s on the consumer, NOT the tobacco companies by the way.

Stop smoking.

Ban the sale of cigarettes instead. I’m all for it

Kathleen @ 65

GeorgeSimian @ 23

Come on. The facts about trickle down economics speak for themselves. They don’t work. But I don’t think that’s what Bush means.

“trickle down” basically means piss on them.

then it would be tinkle down economics

JF @ 69

Cozumel @ 68

That’s what I thought, yet another bullsh*t sin tax. And that’s on the consumer, NOT the tobacco companies by the way.

Stop smoking.

That’s not a good answer to the philosophical issue here. One paternalistic government. Two taxing the peasant, and not the feudal lord (BigTobacco.) To tell anyone to change their lifestyle is repulsive to me. Sorta like try abstinence in the face of AIDS.

oldtree @ 49

I am sick of watching … president make nice with the demo front runner. Decorum is a sickening thing because it shows complicity and conspiracy.

Maybe that’s precisely the message the repubble strategists wish you to take away from the experience. Else, why would they do it, eh?

just a thot….
every move the r’s make is calculated….
don’t trust them….
don’t “buy” their product….

Cozumel @ 77

JF @ 69

Stop smoking.

Ban the sale of cigarettes instead. I’m all for it

DING!DING!DING!

…but NO WAY will they ever be illegal. Too much money to be made by big tobacco and the health care industry.

Please don’t throw too many things at me, but the American Cancer Society has a very healthy lobby in DC. Sometimes I think they, like many other organizations, hedge their bets when working the Beltway. JMO

Christy Hardin Smith @ 43

Elliott at 41 — I know — I loved that shot. Reminds me of when The Peanut was tiny, and I used to be mesmerized by how beautiful her little fingers were, curling around my own as she slept on top of my chest while we sat on the couch. SIGH I miss the tiny days, although I have to say the more expressive older days are pretty fun as well. ;-)

Just wait until she’s 8-9-10 (most fun age ever), 11-12-13 (most challenging as a mom with a daughter but still awe-inspiring as they turn into young women/men), 14-17 (most interesting as they develop debating skills and learn to out-argue Mom and Dad), and 18-20 (my kids’ ages) as they leave home and grow independent.

Hi Kathleen.

I left you a note downstairs at TRex late late.
Thanks for all the links you shared down there. ;->

kdh22 @ 81

Cozumel @ 77

Ban the sale of cigarettes instead. I’m all for it

DING!DING!DING!

…but NO WAY will they ever be illegal. Too much money to be made by big tobacco and the health care industry.

Please don’t throw too many things at me, but the American Cancer Society has a very healthy lobby in DC. Sometimes I think they, like many other organizations, hedge their bets when working the Beltway. JMO

Last time I heard the American Cancer Society had some conflict of interests which caused Breast Cancer to split. Plus prohibition never works in this country. It only creates an illegal black market.

Cozumel @ 67

That’s what I thought, yet another bullsh*t sin tax. And that’s on the consumer, NOT the tobacco companies by the way.

It does make you wonder… Do they ever think about increasing the tax on alcohol? Or heck, legalizing marijuana and then taxing the hell out of it.

Maui @ 75: Your point about sin taxes is well taken. This legislation has such merit it should not require funding via a regressive tax on cigarettes. Unfortunately Dems don’t have the fortitude to call for an increase in the income tax on the wealthy to pay for SCHIP. Too many people either think they are wealthy or are soon to be wealthy.

PA_Lady @ 85

Cozumel @ 67

That’s what I thought, yet another bullsh*t sin tax. And that’s on the consumer, NOT the tobacco companies by the way.

It does make you wonder… Do they ever think about increasing the tax on alcohol? Or heck, legalizing marijuana and then taxing the hell out of it.

Or prostition or gambling. Or anything in the sex industry like topless dancing.

jim oconnor @ 86

Maui @ 75: Your point about sin taxes is well taken. This legislation has such merit it should not require funding via a regressive tax on cigarettes. Unfortunately Dems don’t have the fortitude to call for an increase in the income tax on the wealthy to pay for SCHIP. Too many people either think they are wealthy or are soon to be wealthy.

I am for this legislation because it is important. I understand the rest.

thanks for the reps info to call… this needs to pass!

cc in nc @ 82

Just wait until she’s 8-9-10 (most fun age ever), 11-12-13 (most challenging as a mom with a daughter but still awe-inspiring as they turn into young women/men), 14-17 (most interesting as they develop debating skills and learn to out-argue Mom and Dad), and 18-20 (my kids’ ages) as they leave home and grow independent.

Absolutely. My kids (20, 18, & 15yo) still take my breath away.

mui @ 87

Or prostition or gambling. Or anything in the sex industry like topless dancing.

Airport bathrooms? :)