Keeping health care for already-born children
“We are eating our seed corn.” — Marian Wright Edelman, Children’s Defense Fund
What a lot of love U.S. Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) and 239 of his colleagues heaped on pre-babies last week. They so adore one-day-might-be children that they passed an amendment to the House health care bill that deals a harsh blow to reproductive rights. They wanted to make sure that a woman can’t easily purchase private insurance that covers abortions in a proposed insurance exchange, even with her own money.
Given their passion over fetuses, you’d think that those 240 House members would be able to whip up some enthusiasm for actual children — squalling babes-in-arms, squirming toddlers, restless junior high schoolers — who could lose their health insurance under the House version of health care reform. But try as she might, Marian Wright Edelman — head of a Washington-based children’s advocacy group, the Children’s Defense Fund — hasn’t been able to muster much concern over the proposed demise of the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP).
CHIP — which, since 1997, has fueled creation of enormously popular and successful low-cost health insurance programs for kids in all 50 states — is expected to provide health insurance for 14 million children by 2013. The plans cover children whose parents earn too much to qualify for Medicaid but who cannot afford private insurance plans. Under the House health care bill, however, the program would expire in 2013, when the bill’s provisions would set up insurance exchanges.
Working-class parents would be expected to purchase insurance for themselves and their families through the exchanges. But problems abound with that approach. First off, it would interrupt the insurance that many children already have as parents are forced to cope with a different bureaucracy to find new insurance plans. Second, the exchanges might easily be more expensive. Yes, many families would be eligible for subsidies; but there is no guarantee the policies for their children would be as affordable, or as comprehensive, as they are under the CHIP programs.
“Those exchanges are untested,” Edelman pointed out. “Why would you want to make children worse off in health care reform?
Edelman is exasperated at the attention that has been lavished on senior citizens — “My grandchildren are more important than me,” she said — and annoyed by the energy diverted by inconsequential or made-up issues, like the fraudulent death panels. She expected the debate over health care reform to allow children’s advocates to build on the success of CHIP.
She thought she’d be lobbying for a less formidable bureaucracy, so that parents could enroll their children more easily. Some states, like Georgia, use a daunting system of rules and regulations to keep children off the rolls, just as private insurers use so-called “recission” to drop consumers after they get sick. (Like Medicaid, CHIP is a program whose costs are shared by the states and the federal government.) But instead of leading the charge for a simplified system, Edelman is fighting just to keep it alive.
In some ways, the program is a victim of its success. After President George W. Bush twice vetoed expansions of CHIP, Democrats promised to pour money into the program. In February, a Democratically-controlled Congress set aside funds to keep the program alive through 2013. With that, members of Congress patted themselves on the back and went off to satisfy other constituencies.
Like the elderly, who already have Medicare. They have been coddled throughout the health care debate, as both Democrats and Republicans rushed to pander to them. You’d think that, instead, Congress would want to make sure children are healthy enough to become working adults who can support an aging population.
Now that the House has declared its unyielding support for the fetus, perhaps Congress can be persuaded to lavish a little more attention on children already born. They shouldn’t be given short shrift just because they had the audacity to leave the womb.
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89 comments Add your comment
mike
November 13th, 2009
5:26 pm
Tucker is right. Pro-life folks don’t really care about children at all. Only people who are pro-choice care about children.
So how simple the world is in Tuckerland? People who share her narrow minded views are good and people who don’t share her narrow minded views are bad.
booger
November 13th, 2009
5:28 pm
Thus the dilemma of entitlements. When you have so many they are tripping over each other, there are bound to be some complications.
jconservative
November 13th, 2009
6:33 pm
If you want to use the police power of the central government to outlaw abortion then you should also demand the use of the police power of the central government to care for those children after birth. A child is a child is a child.
But we do not, we are one of the worst countries in the western world for infant mortality.
If abortion is an abomination then lack of health care for children is an abomination.
TnGelding
November 13th, 2009
6:56 pm
jconservative
November 13th, 2009
6:33 pm
Infant mortality is hurt by mothers that smoke, drink amd use drugs, something that is all to prevalent in the greatest country in history.
Cynthia, you left out one important thing. Medicaid is going to cover families with higher incomes, thus less need for SCHIP. That said I don’t support any of the bills currently being discussed in Congress.
“The House bill sets a new income limit for Medicaid of 150 percent of the poverty line. This limit would apply to children and adults under age 65 who are not eligible for Medicare. For the first time, low-income adults who do not have dependent children (and are not elderly or disabled) would be eligible for Medicaid. (The Senate Finance Committee bill would expand Medicaid to 133 percent of the poverty line.)”
Also, Medicare Advantage (Part ‘C’) is being cut, which it should be.
Joan
November 13th, 2009
7:21 pm
If you can’t afford to raise a child, the answer is simple. Don’t have it.
Public Option Doing Swell
November 13th, 2009
8:18 pm
House Speaker Glenn Richardson has indicated the Republican meme for health care by attempting suicide Sunday night, and one major question is why law enforcement did not alert a physician to issue a 1021 to hospitalize Richardson so that he could not do harm to himself and to designate the best possible treatment for him.
This is a republican paradigm for bad healthcare Perhaps Richardson was depresed because white hick Republicans are the only legislature in the US to refuse to fund the 8th largest Metro transit system in the U.S.
Public Option Doing Swell
November 13th, 2009
8:23 pm
What most people are overlooking, and one more reason the Stupak amendment won’t survive Senate or Conference, is that it would prevent insurance companies from covering D&C’s as it is written and D&C is a widely used modality for women’s health in a large variety of situations which cause vaginal bleeding as adjunct to a hysteroscopy and/or polypectomy.
This includes irregular bleeding, polyps, and cancer among many other indications.
Are Blue Dogs and Republicans medically stupid? You betcha goshdarnit.
Public Option Doing Swell
November 13th, 2009
8:25 pm
The house bill is woefully inadequate on many fronts, and what passes won’t resemble it. It does have a number of useful components which may survive.
mike
November 13th, 2009
8:51 pm
Public Option Doing Swell -
So the guy who likes to claim that he is a medical professional is mocking someone suffering from depression for attempting suicide?
I really hope that your claims of being a medical professional is a lie, because it would be scary to think that someone like you is out there in the medical system. Your mindless hatred for those who dare not share your narrow minded views overwhelms all of your other personal characteristics. You are a sad and lonely person who has dedicated his life to mindless hatred. So sad for you.
mmm, mmm, mmm, Barack the LIAR Obama
November 13th, 2009
9:39 pm
So typical of liberals. The government should FORCE tax payers to continue to pay for poor choices people make. And it alawys for the children. Just like school funding, throw money at the problem, yet it NEVER goes away. Just curious, how much is enough?
Herby Beggs
November 13th, 2009
10:21 pm
I understand your desires for health care for children and adults. However; we cannot as a people forget to protect the innocent child waiting for birth into this world. Please let them get into this America or they cannot be insured. Don’t forget each of us were spared that mercy.
Common Sense
November 13th, 2009
10:50 pm
Ms. Tucker:
I have a question for you. When in the life of a child is a mother most a mother? When the child within her is 100% dependent on her protection and care or after the child is born and it can be totally cared for by another – even a man?
GaPeach1st
November 13th, 2009
10:53 pm
“Those exchanges are untested,” Edelman pointed out. “Why would you want to make children worse off in health care reform?”
Why would you want to make ANYBODY worse off in health care reform?
I don’t recall any attention that has been “lavished” (a word commonly used by Tucker to describe Medicare and senior citizens) on senior citizens with regard to the healhcare legislation being proposeed . . . quite the contrary. How is cutting billions out of Medicare over the next 10 years “lavishing” attention on senior citizens. I really worry about Tucker’s hatred for senior citizens; I sure would like to know where that hatred comes from.
Common Sense
November 13th, 2009
10:53 pm
P.S.
I love churches who when recognizing mothers on “Mothers Day” ask those who lost a child before they were born to also stand …………… for they truly were also mothers.
Common Sense
November 13th, 2009
10:55 pm
GaPeach1st:
You are so right. Maybe Ms. Tucker will adopt a senior citizen and take him/her into her home?
Grumpy
November 13th, 2009
11:02 pm
booger nailed it in the 2nd post
Common Sense
November 13th, 2009
11:12 pm
Ms. Tucker:
The problem with the phrase “reproductive rights” is that a woman seeking those so-called rights has already reproduced. We can debate at what point in the womb that reproduction becomes a child (conception, first heart beat, first brain wave, first reaction to sound, first thumb sucking, etc.) but the “production” is there !!
Shouldn’t the correct phrase be “delivery rights”?
WILLIAM H.
November 13th, 2009
11:57 pm
AS A SENIOR CITIZEN WHO READS MS TUCKER’S COLUMN EVERY DAY I DEFINITELY DETECT A STRONG BIAS AS IT PERTAINS TO SENIORS. MAYBE IT IS BECAUSE WE HAVE WORKED HARD AND NOW ARE CLAIMING THE EARNED FRUITS OF OUR LABORS?!
Common Sense
November 14th, 2009
12:06 am
To William H.
You (and I) will soon have the status of a “senior fetus” ………. expendable.
TnGelding
November 14th, 2009
2:56 am
Joan
November 13th, 2009
7:21 pm
Preferably, don’t conceive it.
WILLIAM H.
November 13th, 2009
11:57 pm
Wonder why that is?
Common Sense
November 14th, 2009
12:06 am
I wouldn’t go that far, but we definitely need to have a living will.
Bitter EX democrackkk
November 14th, 2009
6:39 am
Let EACH parent pay for HIS/HER OWN children’s healthcare! Healthcare is NOT a government responsibility NOR function! ‘Dont breed em if you cant feed em!’ Lets have some TRUE parental repsonsiblity!
STRIVE to be SMARTER than the evil controlling democrackkks WANT you to BE!
clyde
November 14th, 2009
6:45 am
Ms.Tucker,
You are going to wake up one morning in the not too distant future and discover you are one.A dreaded senior citizen.
I believe that children should be taken care of.I believed in it so strongly that my wife and I actually had two and we took care of them.in fact,in our family we have this sort of weird tradition.If we have children we take care of them.We’ve always done it without running to the government for help.We work.Many times the jobs are boring and tedious,but they put biscuits on the table.
We worked and took care of our children and it makes us angry that other people don’t.It also makes us angry to see someone like you saying it’s all right for the government to take our hard earned money and use it to raise other people mistakes.
SouthernGal
November 14th, 2009
6:53 am
Be careful of your government…why do they want abortion covered? Is this a step towards controlling who will be allowed to have children?
Gerald West
November 14th, 2009
6:57 am
Just goes to show how foolish all the actual and proposed medical payment schemes are: mulitple programs involving federal and state bureacracies, private insurers that ration health care, insurance exchanges, restrictions due to religious superstition, etc.
Why not just do it better and cheaper, like all other developed countries? Let medical providers treat everyone who needs it, without restriction; let everyone pay the medical costs with their taxes rather than endure a blizzard of application forms, medical bills, claims forms throughout the year?
Medicare for all is the workable approach. All others approaches are dumb as pig drool!
Bob
November 14th, 2009
7:21 am
Jconsevative, one of the worst in the world for infant mortality, thats an ignorant statement. Pre-natal is available to women that do not even pay for it. In most third world countries, if a woman is having problems the pregnacy is usually lost. When that happens, it does not show up in any viable statistic in regard to infant mortality. In America, that same woman gets free assistance to save the child. Everything is done to bring the baby to term and if at that time it dies, it shows up as infant mortality. In America the baby was given a chance. Can you give us the standard that is used across the world when determining infant mortality ? You can’t because each country uses it’s own. Like the above scenario, the third world baby that dies in the womb is not an infant mortality, the American example where the baby is given enough help to actually be born, then dies is an infant mortality.
In Europe, some countries won’t list a baby as an infant mortality until it’s 24 hours old, some won’t list unless the baby is born above 4 pounds. You can go to the Congo to have your next kid, I’ll take Piedmont or Northside. You are surely an Obama supporter.
lovelyliz
November 14th, 2009
7:22 am
Hypocricy in healthcare for children is easy when you are a faux pro-lifer who believes that life begins at conception and ends at birth. UYou can cliam to be pro0life with a clear conscience when you are merely pro-birth.
catlady
November 14th, 2009
7:51 am
I agree about your comments on Medicare. The elderly should not be sacred cows, discriminated for because of a number. However, I do not support CHIP. It is an overly generous program that does not encourage responsible behavior by parents. CHIP kids can go to the ER innumerable times (free), get every kind of therapy only dreamed of by most people (free), etc, etc, and PARENTS DON’T PAY A PREMIUM UNTIL THE CHILD IS SIX (and then a small amount based on unsubstantiated family income). I don’t support CHIP unless all children are covered for 6 years for free, regardless of parent income, and all children have unlimited access to doctors, dentists, therapists, the ER, etc, without cost. GET RID OF CHIP or cover ALL kids the same! Encourage parental responsibility!
catlady
November 14th, 2009
7:56 am
Re: the Speaker. Hope he gets well. Let’s go back and look at his voting record on funding mental health care, shall we? Might be instructive.
Go Jackets
November 14th, 2009
8:23 am
This is disgusting. “One day might be children.” Give me a break Cynthia.
Vinny
November 14th, 2009
8:47 am
Cynthia – Making a decision to kill the unborn babies is an elective procedure that should not be covered with taxpayer dollars. period.
Question
November 14th, 2009
8:51 am
Many above are on target — if you can’t afford to have/raise children, don’t! The government is not responsible for your poor life and financial choices!!
TaxPayer
November 14th, 2009
8:59 am
Let’s just eliminate insurance for anyone that cannot afford it.
jconservative
November 14th, 2009
9:02 am
TnGelding “Infant mortality is hurt by mothers that smoke, drink amd use drugs, something that is all to prevalent in the greatest country in history.”
Then is the answer to allow abortions on those babies? Your comment avoids the issue, maybe they do die because of the mothers drugs, etc.
Do you really want to say that is OK because you do not want to fund health care for all children? Your tax money is more important than thousands of babies lives? Look, you & I have debated too many issues & I know that is not your position. Please clarify.
————————-
Joan “If you can’t afford to raise a child… Don’t have it.”
Then is the answer to allow abortions on those babies? Joan do you suggest you want to allow those babies that are conceived & born to die because you do not want a “socialistic” health care system to be created out of your tax money?
Just asking for clarification of your position.
clyde
November 14th, 2009
9:03 am
Dear Bob @ 0721
Live birth mortality rate per 1000,for 2009,The U.S.ranks 46th.When mortality rates per 1000 are considered for all children under 5 years old we improve to no.33. j.conservative’s statement therefore stands unamended.
jconservative
November 14th, 2009
9:06 am
Vinny “Cynthia – Making a decision to kill the unborn babies is an elective procedure that should not be covered with taxpayer dollars. period.”
Do you also believe that the public decision to not use “taxpayer dollars” to care for born babies & allow them to die from lack of medical care is the correct decision?
Del
November 14th, 2009
9:18 am
Bob,Catlady, Vinny, Question…Absolutely well stated
Mike, There is another one who purports to be a doctor called Gov. Option who also spits out hate in his/her comments. I made a generalized statement the other day commenting on some who have to rant with anger and this Gov. Option thinking that I was referring to him/her shot back at me saying that he/she had saved lives from gunshot wounds on numerous occasions and would like to “throw me in the E/R with multiple hollow points in my chest” Of course for anyone in that described condition shot by multiple expanding JHP (hollow point) rounds the chances for survival would be about 99% against. Obviously this individual couldn’t have possessed experience treating gun shot trauma wounds without a working knowledge of ballistics associated with expanding ammunition. None the less this kind of comment was way over the top and I reported it to the AJC. I wonder if I’ll get a response.
Sam
November 14th, 2009
9:28 am
Life vs. Dollars? I’ll take life.
jconservative
November 14th, 2009
9:32 am
Bob at 7:21 am – “You are surely an Obama supporter.”
Actually I am a supporter of children who have been born and lack proper medical care.
Let’s say you are 100% correct & the US is the best country on the planet when it comes to infant mortality.
And let’s say that your statement that “Pre-natal is available to women that do not even pay for it” is 100% correct.
My position is that we also provide health care to every child in the country.
Your comment does not address that position.
For the record infant mortality in the US is as follows:
2000…6.89%, 2001…6.84%, 2002…6.95%, 2003…6.84%, 2004…6.78%,
2005…6.86%, 2006…6.71%(preliminary).
As for being an Obama supporter – wrong.
Joan
November 14th, 2009
10:28 am
About clarification: I am a conservative, believing in individual rights and responsibilities. I believe that if you want to have something, you pay for it, including a child. If you want not to have the child, then you pay for an abortion. Yes, I think that abortions done in the first trimester should be the inidividual’s right and responsibility. That doesn’t mean the government should pay for it, and it doesn’t mean I think abortion is ok anytime, or as a form of birth control. I think there is a place for reasonableness in all of this discussion. I am not “for abortions”, nor am I for unfettered “free choice” except under limited circumstances like, not as birth control, and not late term. There are always exceptions to any rule.
Del
November 14th, 2009
10:39 am
Joan,
I would certainly agree with your 10:28am post. Abortion in a case where the mother’s health is at risk. Rape, incest two gray areas, however, I certainly wouldn’t be one to pass judgment. No tax payer dollars for elective abortions other than the above.
Joe
November 14th, 2009
10:45 am
“Pre Babies”? When do they become “Babies”? Is abortion ok at 8 1/2 months? How about 7 months…6 months? When Cynthia? You need a reality check. Why don’t you go observe a late term abortion and then report on how the “pre baby” was not a real child. Lady, you need help!
Peaches
November 14th, 2009
10:46 am
Nothing pisses off Cynthia Tucker like protecting the unborn.
Joe
November 14th, 2009
10:59 am
With apologies to Jeff..If you like killing babies and protecting murderers…you might be a liberal.
Common Sense
November 14th, 2009
11:54 am
Ms. Tucker:
I CHALLENGE YOU (or anyone else) to explain any difference to me between a child in the womb and one outside of the womb except in one area ……… the method of oxygen intake (lungs vs. umbilical cord) …… which has nothing to do with the definition of what is “human life”.
If you try to say “viability” that doesn’t get it either. That child is NOT viable “outside” the womb UNLESS SOMEONE TAKES CARE OF IT. If you just let it lay there for a couple of days it will die.
The child in not viable “in” the womb UNLESS THE MOTHER TAKES CARE OF IT.
Your turn ……………..
Jim
November 14th, 2009
12:12 pm
Why do you have children if you cannot afford them? There was a time when people had 8,10, or 12 like my grandparents. They raised them without government help. Maybe, this situation is more related to dysfunctional and immoral people than to the confusion over whose responsible for their care. I wonder how many children you are taking care of?
Franky
November 14th, 2009
12:32 pm
Mr. Richardson, just switch and become a Democrat and all your thoughts of suicide will go away.
Linda
November 14th, 2009
2:06 pm
“Free” abortion paid by taxpayers encourages bad behavior.
If you can’t afford a car, new furniture, 20 pairs of shoes, children, etc., wait until you can.
If you make a mistake, take responsibility for it. I take responsibility for mine.
If you can’t afford or don’t want children, try abstinence, birth control &/or not watching Oprah.
Constructive Feedback
November 14th, 2009
2:45 pm
MARK THIS AS A FIRST!!!! CYNTHIA TUCKER TACITLY ATTACKS A DEMOCRAT RATHER THAN A REPUBLICAN!!!! (Well they are conservative Democrats but I still credit her none the less).
Ms Tucker – yours is an intellectually dishonest argument.
In your statist mind you attempt to shift the burden for the care and feeding of these children who survived the abortionist’s vacuum from their PARENTS over to society at large. It appears that you are comfortable making us all wards of the state.
The question of if a woman should forcibly detach a child that is gestating inside of her womb from its nutrition source via an outpatient surgery that has been deemed legal VERSUS the notion that the government should provide all of the health care that this child might need after it is born are two totally distinct arguments. The responsibility resides with the PARENTS and the FAMILY to insure that they have the appropriate conditions within which this child is born and that the medical and financial resources are available to do so.
It would be interesting if you were to shift your argument from the perspective of “How could the CENTRAL GOVERNMENT be so callus as to allow this to happen” over to “How can a set of adults with working reproductive organs and an extended family seeking to recreate the next generation in an optimum fashion allow their offspring to be born in an environment where some minimum threshold of his needs can be met”?
It is clear with you the goal is to get us ALL upon the government dole.
ken
November 14th, 2009
3:31 pm
Be a witness to an abortion Cynthia and give us a report!!!!!!!!! Give us the details !!!!!!!!
Common Sense
November 14th, 2009
3:36 pm
To Ken:
Amen …………… Like the abortion clinic supervisor who did just that recently and is now pro-life.
Recovering Demoholic
November 14th, 2009
3:42 pm
HR3926 stinks as badly as Obama, Pelosi, and Reid. Kill it! That’s all there is to it.
Ken
November 14th, 2009
4:53 pm
Cynthia would never watch an actual abortion, like most liberals, she is intellectually dishonest, manipulating the “facts” to meet her SICK view of what is right. Hello Cynthia….prove me wrong! Then again, if she really believes her rant, she’d probably enjoy it.
ken
November 14th, 2009
5:09 pm
I wonder if she would cry.
Jack
November 14th, 2009
6:16 pm
Promiscuous behavior should not be rewarded with welfare.
mcadoo11
November 14th, 2009
7:36 pm
People completely miss the point of her column. She is saying that the concern and passion people have for the unborn should not end when children are born. Many of those voting for protecting fetuses then vote to deny children coverage through CHIP. Tucker is pointing out the hypocrisy of that and there is a bit of some “protesting too much” in the comments. And, for those suggesting that denying children health coverage is somehow good, that means they are less healthy, miss school, and fail to thrive. That only harms our nation and is short-sighted.
DBCOOPER
November 15th, 2009
6:31 am
The government will give us all ice cream! The government will take care of all our needs. The government has our best interest at heart. They spend our tax money wisely, they are all of moral rightousness. They will take from the evil rich people and give me my fair share. They aren’t eating our seed corn now at all. The national dept rises 1 million dollars per minute. Americans are struggling but our gracious government is taking care of our helth care to the tune of 1.3 trillion dollars. Wow BUT HEY IT’S ABOUT FETUSES AND TRANSPARENCY. i’M so glad we elected a moral and non corrupt president. He surrounds himself with upstanding and moral tax payers and America loving individuals. Like Van Jones and Tim Geitner. Oh wer are so lucky America.
lovelyliz
November 15th, 2009
8:37 am
The United States has a per caita rate of infant mortality that is higher than Cuba,
Just ask the CIA
dmac
November 15th, 2009
8:42 am
Let’s see, Mrs. Tucker writes a piece extolling the virtues of CHIP. Conservatives respond with vitriol over abortion rights and Medicare.
In other words, Mrs. Tucker makes a case for protecting and expanding a popular and successful government program and conservatives have reasonable response.
No wonder most people are no longer Republican.
lou
November 15th, 2009
9:09 am
I bet those 8 or 12 grandchildren went to public schools, dont stand up and say you or your family never had goverment help.
steve
November 15th, 2009
9:48 am
Once again made the mistake of venturing outside of the sports sections. Let’s see- 50% of Americans are pro life and more than 50% of Americans believe that the health care bill is not proper in its current form. Given that, Cynthia once again alienates the majority of Americans but using her “pen” not intellectually, but as stick to whack people. Cynthia, would you be so kind as to reprint a couple of your articles- one was about there never being voter fraud and there was another series that illegal immigrants never commit crimes. Anyway, great country, drink some wine, write and op ed piece in 15 minutes for the AJC. For me, I shall return to my Economist.
Max Arnold
November 15th, 2009
10:13 am
It seems that Cynthia can only write about U. S. governments handouts. Boring.
Geriatric Blunders
November 15th, 2009
10:20 am
Enter your comments here
Geriatric Blunders
November 15th, 2009
10:21 am
D’oh!
DAVID
November 15th, 2009
10:56 am
TUCKER always writes from MJs NEVER-NEVER Land Ranch
Workingtaxpayer
November 15th, 2009
11:12 am
Tucker will be the demise of AJC with her daily left wing drivel.
BoneHead
November 15th, 2009
12:59 pm
If we keep aborting liberals then in a generation or two it would solve our country’s problems…
Cox Chum Bucket
November 15th, 2009
1:03 pm
You idiots at Cox/AJC have no feel for Atlanta. You have blown out so many good reporters your paper mirrors nothing of life here present or past. Jim Axel dies 30 hours ago and not a mention from you blowhards. 34 years on Atlanta television covering our lives for decades and you clowns are too busy with Souper Jenny recipes or a rapper getting tossed out of a posh hotel. This is a cool city with almost 5 million people. Your paper deserves it’s fate. I laugh when I walk past your machines charging a dollar. Congrats clown team.
AF
November 15th, 2009
1:09 pm
Look, I am usually a fan of Ms. Tucker. But this article could lead folks to an erroneous conclusion.
Children are going to have a health insurance option under the new health plan. So what if CHIP goes away? There will be another program.
It is not necessarily a problem that the new federal health insurance laws will “interrupt the insurance that many children already have[through CHIP] as parents are forced to cope with a different bureaucracy to find new insurance plans.” Anyone who works for an employer who changes provisions in a health care plan or changes carriers has the problem of interruption in the insurance they currently ahve and learning a new bureauracy. All these words are fear of change without any substantial facts to support the fear. And, things change; that is called life.
Then there is the supposed problem of “the exchanges might easily be more expensive. Yes, many families would be eligible for subsidies; but there is no guarantee the policies for their children would be as affordable, or as comprehensive, as they are under the CHIP programs.”
Quite true, the exchange MIGHT be more expensive. The exchanges are untested – so was CHIP when it first started. Quite true – there are NO GUARANTEES that the new program will look exactly like the old program. It will be a new program, no one knows all the details yet.
Edelman asks: “Why would you want to make children worse off in health care reform?” And there is nothing in Ms Tuckers story to say what change, other than change itself, will negatively impact chldren’s healthcare.
GEEZ!!! This is the kind of thing that drives me crazy.
steve
November 15th, 2009
2:23 pm
Take out car accidents and put every country on par with a time frame of categorizing infant mortality and the US fares very well. Stats are great when shown in a vacuum.
Jessica
November 15th, 2009
2:39 pm
For one thing, this is comparing apples to oranges. It’s one thing to oppose an entitlement program to help children; it’s quite another to sanction and even encourage the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of children every year.
Also, the idea that conservatives are greedy and uncharitable is just plain wrong. Take a look at the book entitled “Who Really Cares” by Syracuse University professor Arthur Brooks. Across all income levels, conservative Americans give MUCH more to charity than liberals who have comparable income.
The issue isn’t who really cares about kids; it’s about the BEST way to help them. Most conservatives believe in helping families become self-sufficient by creating (real) jobs and providing private charity to help the truly needy. The goal is for almost everyone to become independent, productive and free.
Liberals, by contrast, seem to want to create government programs to provide cradle-to-grave care for a permanent underclass. This robs families of their dignity and makes them beholden to the political party that doles out the goodies. There is lots of talk about creating a way out of poverty, but all the programs, services and initiatives actually trap people in poverty and keep them there for generations.
Common Sense
November 15th, 2009
2:46 pm
Dear Conservative Posters:
I have been reviewing most of the posts on this weekend thread and something just came to me. In general (there is always an exception now and then) liberals and conservatives post/debate in entirely different ways. Let me try to explain it this way.
For those over 50, do you remember the old “school yard fights” before zero tolerance and felony arrests kicked in ? Well, apply lessons from those physical fights to our verbal fights on this thread.
Boys then were like conservatives today ……….. they would size each other up, make a few challenges in a reasonable attempt to make their point and prevent further confrontation. However, if necessary the “fist fight” was on but then it was over very briefy. One would lose (bloody nose or black eye) and one would win. The important thing was the winner was satisfied and the loser also (because he knew the other guy knew he would fight). Usually, since the pecking order was now established, they would shake hands and be best friends the next day.
Girls on the other hand are like today’s liberals …………….. they would start throwing books, cussing, screaming and shrieking and then the most awful “cat fight” would errupt with the pulling of hair, scratching, tearing of clothes, etc., etc., etc. Eventually, someone would have to pull them apart or they would kill each other. Needless to say, they were enemies pretty much for life.
The point I am trying to make is that liberals and conservatives think and debate differently. Liberals really do get upset with you if you make a point they can’t handle and generally on these posts they are the one’s most involved in personal attacks on other posters. It’s really quite interesting to observe.
Just one example: Liberals love Mike Luchovich’s biting satire in his cartoons. Those are o.k. and the sharper the better. However, let a conservative do the same thing in a “word picture” on one of these threads and they really get hot. I’m sure you remember how vicious they were towards Bush when he was President but if you even dare speak ill of the “messiah” they WILL go off on you.
Just one man’s opinion ……………… and food for thought. Hope it helps.
Now get ready for the screaming and shrieking and ………………………
booger
November 15th, 2009
3:04 pm
Even for Cynthia this is pretty far out there. So her solution to the enormous problem of some families possibly having to find a new insurance plan, subsidized by the Government, is to have duplicate health care entitlements for children.
I remember three years ago when Mike King was the health care guru on the editorial board, he stated that some of the more radical spokesmen for the right were trying to frighten people by telling them an expanded peach care program would lead to universal health care. Well seems sometimes even the radical right wing is right. Now we are a selfish country because we won’t offer two health plans to families with children.
The old give em an inch saying was spot on.
ksiujgth
November 15th, 2009
5:01 pm
everyone should just refuse to buy health insurance and queen nancy will put everyone in jail and provide free healthcare along with three hots and a cot.
Had Enough w/ Tucker's Lies
November 15th, 2009
5:45 pm
As usual, Cynthia Tucker is again wrong on the CHIP program. SCHIP is a supplemental Medicaid and State healthcare program for low income parents children, under the age of “30″, that the House of Representative passed this year. This is the biggest free money giveaway increases in history and upped the annual income levels to $49,750 per year to qualify all thier children. Bush vetoed the bill twice because the level to qualify was $32,500 and he thought that the increase was to due to the deficit.
What a joke you are Cynthia, Medicare and the elderly stand to have their healthcare CUT by $500 billion dollars under ObamaCare. Don’t ever forget that the elderly have worked all their lives to reach 65 to earn the Medicare and the young punks have not. Sham on you for your lies!!
Lovebugs
November 15th, 2009
7:02 pm
First of all: Your belief that a fetus is a baby and should never be aborted is NOT shared by all people. In fact, up to 2/3 of Americans support abortion depending on the circumstances. It really isn’t up to you to prescribe your beliefs unto the rest of us. Frankly, you are going down a slippery slope. Unless you want me to start telling YOU that I won’t care for you because you are FAT and got DIABETES. (I know: poor you! its genetic you can’t help it. ha ha), then stay away from the choices the rest of the country gets in health care.
Second, my kids have CHIP. Its not FREE. There is a premium. Granted that it is small. My apologies. I must be a terrible parent. It turns out that my husband’s small business saw a significant reduction in profits these past two years. We could no longer afford the 725 a month for their premiums. We got two months behind. They don’t take partial payments and we were suddenly without insurance for the kids.
Once upon a time, I was equally as judgmental as you are. Grow up! I thought, if you have kids, you pay for them. Well, guess what? I got caught by a safety net. I pay taxes and have paid taxes. I pay my premiums and I have used the card twice for doctors and once a month for prescriptions in six months.
Lovebugs
November 15th, 2009
7:06 pm
Common Sense:
Conservatives are like passive-aggressive victim types. They adopt a superior holier than thou attitude and then get mad because they provoke sarcasm in return. Please work on your codependency in therapy.
chuck allison
November 15th, 2009
7:09 pm
Cynthia, you describe unborn children as not human. You are one of the liberals responsible for the slaughter of millions of unborn children in our nation. If you approve, and do not resist, then you should consider yourself guilty. You mock those who would protect these defenseless children.
Dawg Fan 74
November 15th, 2009
7:54 pm
Cynthia rarely has logical thoughts.
Her answer is always more government.
c.j.
November 15th, 2009
8:14 pm
Honestly, Ms. Tucker, 50 million abortions later, that is 50 million children not here on earth, wiped out, and you’re all of a sudden concerned about the quality of children “already here.” Really? A children in need can go to any E.R. and get care, Ms. Tucker. Can an aborted child do that? This has to be the most idiotic viewpoint article I have ever read! I guess the end always justifies the means in Tucker’s world.
Algonquin J. Calhoun
November 15th, 2009
9:39 pm
If you can’t afford to raise a child, the answer is simple. Don’t have it.
Joan, I gather your parents were well off enough to afford you but what about the children who are born into life but are unwanted? My brother and his wife couldn’t have children but they have two wonderful daughters they adopted when the children were infants. Those girls grew up with loving parents who adored them and still do. It is not as simple as you make it sound, nor should it be. Many good people, who weren’t wanted by their birth parents, have come into this world and have contributed.
Algonquin J. Calhoun
November 15th, 2009
9:46 pm
You mock those who would protect these defenseless children.
What Cynhtia is talking about, and you know it full well, is that right-to-lifer Republicans want to make sure children are born but beyond that they don’t want to help with health care, education or even nutrition at school. Remember when Reagan’s administration declared pickle relish a vegetable?
Azazel
November 15th, 2009
10:19 pm
“Reason and Ignorance, the opposites of each other, influence the great bulk of mankind. If either of these can be rendered sufficiently extensive in a country, the machinery of Government goes easily on. Reason obeys itself; and Ignorance submits to whatever is dictated to it.” Thomas Paine, The Rights of Man, Part One, 1791.
Zibby
November 16th, 2009
1:49 am
For the longest time I was allowing all this socialist demoncrap push through-on ObamaCare really get my blood pressure up. Dueling plans and amendments with politicians wasting precious time on an issue that is so far down the food chain of priorities as to be laughable, if it wasn’t really happening…
Then I went back and studied the history again of the New Deal… so many of Roosevelt’s alphabet soup agencies, policies and laws got knocked down at the Supreme Court that it caused FDR to want to stack the Supreme Court with more Democrat justices who would hopefully vote the party line and allow everything through. It didn’t happen. All he managed to do was to start handing Congress back to the Republicans and cause the 1937 recession…
So let ObamaCare become law… who gives a rat’s patootie?
It’s all going to end up in court (Cap and Trade too) and ultimately at the Supreme Court and then the justices will be able to school PBO on something he forgot all about… the Constitution of the United States…
Zibby
November 16th, 2009
1:54 am
Oh, almost forgot – Hey Sinthia – if you’re that bleeding heart over the children and the poor and the stupid and all of that, why are you still writing a column and not out with your sleeves rolled up helping them 24/7? Talk is cheap as you prove with each of your columns… but then is it more of a case of those who can do… those who can’t just try to write about it… badly?
pat
November 16th, 2009
8:29 am
Pre-babies? That language is dishonest and offensive. The “fetuses” are already human beings if you have actual proof that the unborn are not people you need to present it, because science does not suuport your assertion.
The fetus is not a template in which the baby is inserted upon exiting the woman. It is a living human being and your desire to kill people just because their existance is troublesome to you is sad indeed.
Nobody who is pro-aboriton can ever feign that they care about another human being. It is a lie, pro-abortionists cannot care for someone beyond their selfishness. Even Jane Row, (Norma McCorvey) is pro-life. Ironically, she has never had an abortion and is of the biggest pro-life advocates out there. That should be telling enough right there. The person on which Row v. Wade was founded is pro-life, or vehemently anti-abortion.
Abortion is murder, nobody can prove that it is not, period.
Peaches
November 16th, 2009
8:37 am
There is a real discussion to be had about insuring children and the costs and tradeoffs of doing so. It’s just that Cynthia Starts by taking about the Obamacare bill that was amended to preserve a long standing prohibition against using federal funds for abortions. Nothing pisses Cynthia off like protecting the unborn. If this is all about CHP then Cynthia needs to leave out the swipe.
Your morning jolt: ATL police union to endorse Kasim Reed for mayor | Political Insider
November 16th, 2009
8:48 am
[...] Cynthia Tucker on keeping health care for already-born children. [...]
extremerightwing
November 16th, 2009
9:20 am
hey cynthia…sperm + egg = human baby…not a fetus. several hundred years ago african amercians were deemed to be on 3/5ths of a person and that after a lot of struggle and bloodshed are now recognized as full members of society. now, imagaine how all of the murdered babies feel knowing they were called a fetus and not a real person, and that someone like cynthia, whose ancestors were not considered to be a 100% person, and should know better, does not rise up and use her eloquence to defend the most helpless members of our society.
Turd Feguson
November 16th, 2009
9:53 am
Too bad. All this “save the children” mumbo-jumbo is just a cover to get money from the working class then hand it over to the lazy. If the parents cant afford the kid they should abort or put up for adoption.
Stop making problems of the low-lifes everyone elses problems.