Stop the Senate version of the bill the House just passed. Use the ACU draft letter, tailor as you will, or use what you will of mine (below) but WRITE to your Senators!
As one of your constituents, I urge you to vote “NO” on the House version of the SCHIP expansion bill and support instead the substitute bill sponsored by Senators McConnell and Kyl.
The house version does not expand the coverage of health care to poor children, as claimed. Rather, this bill would allow and even encourage states to cover families who have private insurance and make up to $62,000 per year and even more in some cases. As the Congressional Budget Office study shows, 77% of the children that the expansion of this program would include already have personal health insurance. Encouraging them to switch from private insurance to government run health care may serve political objectives but it is disingenuous to suggest it serves the interests of poor children.
The house version is also out-of-step with President Obama’s renewed commitment to accountability in government; it lacks measures needed to insure that our nation’s uninsured, low-income children are covered first. It even prevents the federal government from asking states to certify that 95% of poor children are covered before other children or adults are covered.
Moreover, the fact that the house would expand entitlements without first resolving our social security dilemma is so fiscally irresponsible as to be unconscionable. Proposing that taxes on tobacco might fund this expansion is again blatantly disingenuous. Studies show that 55 percent of smokers are working poor and even your Congressional Research Service called this tax “one of the most regressive taxes.” Such a tax increase is hardly compatible with President-Elect Obama’s pledge of no tax increases for those making less than $250,000 a year. Or shall we recruit millions of new smokers from the ranks of our middle and upper-middle class to pay these bills?
Inevitably, other taxes I pay would increase to fund the long-term costs of this legislation. As a matter of principle, I oppose the use of my tax dollars to fund health care for anyone living above the federal poverty level and most certainly for anyone not legally in our country. By this standard, the SCHIP program is already over-funded. This bill would thus needlessly open the door to a bigger, riskier federal role in health care.
I urge you to take the moral high ground on the SCHIP expansion bill and vote against the intentional deception that the house version would perpetrate on the American people. Please Vote “NO” on the House version and “Yes” on the McConnell/Kyl substitute amendment.
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