Our View - Thursday

Vini, vidi, veto

Bush holds the line on entitlement expansion

President Bush hates kids. We hate kids, too. That’s why we applaud Bush’s veto of a bill that would have greatly expanded the cost and scope of a federal health care program that was designed to assist the poor but is in danger of becoming a new middle-class entitlement.

Actually, we don’t hate children. That’s just the exploitative spin statists use whenever they want to grow government programs. What we hate is watching the unending expansion of a nanny state that treats free people like dependent children who can’t take care of themselves. That’s really why we applaud the veto.

The State’s Children’s Health Insurance Program (which isn’t funded by states but by the federal taxpayer) was originally designed to provide health coverage to children living at twice the federal poverty level or below. But the law granted states too much latitude to tinker with eligibility criteria, creating a loophole large enough to drive a gravy train through. And states have taken full advantage, turning what was intended to be a modest program, tailored to help the needy, into a giveaway for folks who can support themselves.

Bush correctly called Congress’ effort to expand eligibility to families earning up to $83,000 a year “an incremental step toward the goal of government-run health care for every American.” The bill Bush vetoed would have increased program spending by $35 billion, bringing the total cost to $60 billion over 10 years. Coverage would be extended to 2.6 million more beneficiaries — an estimated 1.2 million of whom are currently covered by private insurance.

Extending benefits to nonpoor families “would move millions of American children who now have private health insurance into government-run health care,” Bush said when he leveled his veto threat. “Our goals should be for children who have no health insurance to be able to get private coverage, not for children who already have private health insurance to be able to get government coverage. I believe this is a step toward federalization of health care.”

The president’s right, but he shouldn’t be surprised. From its inception, SCHIP provided tax funds to states for families earning up to twice the federal poverty limit. Once the welfare entitlement line was crossed from serving the poor to serving the near-poor as well, the debate inevitably became one of degree, not of principle.

Bush was willing to increase funding by $5 billion, but wanted to restrict the entitlement to family incomes of no more than twice the poverty level. A majority in Congress wanted to increase the limit to four times the poverty level. Both sides want to subsidize health care for people who don’t qualify for welfare. Whoever prevails, it’s nevertheless “a step toward federalization of health care.”

Even without an expansion of SCHIP, nearly half the nation’s children already are covered by some government health program. Obviously, nowhere near half the nation’s children are poor. We would prefer that the politicians quit quibbling about how much to federalize health care and take steps to defederalize it, by removing government controls, restrictions and mandates so the free market can drive down costs and increase availability.

“States need maximum flexibility to determine how to address the particular needs of their most vulnerable populations, especially our children,” Gov. Bill Ritter said in response to the veto. But states aren’t entitled to “maximum flexibility” when they are spending federal tax dollars.

Politicians such as Ritter are shamelessly using children as pawns to advance a grow-government agenda. If you oppose the creation of a new entitlement, they say, you must hate the beneficiaries. But we believe America’s children will be better off growing up not as wards of the state, but as free people, not dominated by a government that will dictate their medical decisions and plunder their earnings to pay for Utopian promises of “free” health care.

Statists, on the other hand, would like nothing better than to turn today’s children into tomorrow’s government dependents. And this program is explicitly designed to do that.

Kicking a dead heifer

Fort Carson brass must be feeling a bit shell-shocked, following the defeats they’ve suffered on the issue of Piñon Canyon expansion. But the barrage keeps coming, as antiexpansion forces work to secure a complete and unconditional surrender. Their latest tactic is to use federal open records laws to get access to internal government documents, which they can use against the Army.

“Opponents of expanding an Army training site in southeast Colorado have asked the government to turn over information about landowners the Pentagon says are willing to sell property for the project,” The Pueblo Chieftain reported last week. They obviously hope these documents will blow holes in the Army’s contention that people in the area are willing to sell, which expansion opponents vehemently deny.

But we wouldn’t blame the Army if it balked at this request. The release of such information could also blow holes in the privacy of these individuals, if they exist, and it could make them the target of pressure and retaliation from the anti-expansion side.

If there were willing sellers out there when this firestorm erupted, they’re undoubtedly laying low now. And dragging them into the limelight against their will, just because they had some expansion-related discussions with the military, would violate their privacy and endanger their safety.

We urge the Piñon Canyon Expansion Opposition Coalition and Not 1 More Acre to be reasonable, withdraw the request, and show more respect for the privacy of their fellow ranchers. This dispute has already created a lot of mistrust and bad blood. Let’s not turn it into a witch hunt, too. The expansion is all but dead. Don’t the cows need tending?