SCHIP. I hope folks are following the battle over SCHIP (the State Children's Health Insurance Program) in Congress. This is the fight that Rahm Emmanuel likes to call "Spring Training" for universal health care, which helps explain why George W. Bush is readying to veto a bipartisan bill expanding health insurance for children. Here's the state of play: The Senate Finance Committee has drafted, on a bipartisan basis, a reauthorization and expansion of SCHIP that the Congressional Budget Office estimates would extend coverage to 4.1 million currently uninsured children. The expansion of SCHIP would cost $35 billion over the next five years, to be paid for by an increase in the tobacco tax. Bush's reasons for vetoing the plan are purely and explicitly ideological. "The proposal would dramatically expand the Children’s Health Insurance Program, adding nonpoor children to the program, and more than doubling the level of spending,” complains White House spokesman Tony Fratto. "This will have the effect of encouraging many to drop private coverage, to go on the government-subsidized program." So the literal argument here is that the SCHIP change will encourage children to move onto SCHIP, and as a matter of principle, the president wants as few individuals on government-based insurance as possible. Charming. And remember, this all happens in the context of an insurance market that has left over 9 million children without coverage. This is the market Bush sees it as his duty to protect. One way or the other, on September 30th, SCHIP will expire, and the millions of children and families currently relying on it will be without health coverage. The President certainly likes his showdowns. But my guess is a showdown with Congress over whether children should have health care isn't one he's going to win. This seems like a bill Congress could continually send back to his desk, and the more the press reports on the battle lines, the more pressure will build not only for Bush to sign, but for Republicans to overturn his veto. --Ezra Klein
