Suffer the Little Children No More

Late next week, or soon afterward, four million American children, whose health care has been held hostage by George W. Bush's deep sympathy for the profits of private insurers, will finally get the coverage Congress has been trying to give them for almost a year and a half.

Today, the House passed an expansion of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), which now goes to the Senate for quick approval by the new president, who greeted the news thus:

"In this moment of crisis, ensuring that every child in America has access to affordable health care is not just good economic policy, but a moral obligation we hold as parents and citizens. That is why I’m so pleased that Democrats and Republicans in the House of Representatives came together to provide health insurance to over ten million children whose families have been hurt most by this downturn. This coverage is critical, it is fully paid for, and I hope that the Senate acts with the same sense of urgency so that it can be one of the first measures I sign into law when I am President."

In his exit interviews this week, Bush is not bragging about his "philosophical" veto-wielding victory for free enterprise at the expense of children's health and lives. But today's legislation is a quick payoff to voters for getting rid of him and his ilk in the White House.

Maiming Medicare

Having failed to privatize Social Security, the Bush Administration is trying to wreck Medicare on its way out the door, but MDs are mad as hell, and they're taking it out on Congressional Republicans.

The focus this week is on trying to undo a 10.6 percent cut in payment to care providers for millions of older Americans. Before the Fourth of July recess, the House passed a bill to prevent the Medicare pay cut by a vote of 355 to 59. In the Senate, Republicans blocked efforts to take up the bill, so the cut took effect on July 1st.

Now the AMA and its incensed members are targeting such former friends as Sens. John Sununu, Roger Wicker and Arlen Specter, who all voted against cloture.

As with the SCHIP legislation to expand children's health care coverage, Bush and his allies are favoring the insurance industry over a government program that is working well for those who need it most.

If the new reimbursement rates were to stand, more doctors would be joining the legions of those who refuse to take on Medicare patients as economically unsound for their practices.

Perhaps the next step would be the "Ice Floe HMO" solution favored by one in three British doctors who would deny treatment to the old "if it were unlikely to do them good for long."

Unless Republicans relent, as they almost surely will, members of the AARP are certain to send them a don't-get-well message in November.

Democrats' Sickly Approach to Health Care

Even as their presidential candidates debate differences between plans for universal coverage, Congressional Democrats are waving white flags in the coming battle to get anything done.

Leaders of the party that should gain decisive control in November, according to The Hill, are busy explaining the expected defeat of health care reform.

“We all know there is not enough money to do all this stuff,” says Sen. Jay Rockefeller, a Finance Committee member and an Obama backer. “What they are doing is … laying out their ambitions.”

New York's Chuck Schumer, who is for Hillary Clinton, agrees, saying he is “not sure we have the big plan on healthcare...not sure that we’re ready for a major national healthcare plan.”

Translation: The health insurance corporations, the drug companies and their Harry-and-Louise lobbyists will still be draining one out of every three dollars spent to cure and heal Americans for their own profit and drowning out any voices for change with loud chants about "socialized medicine."

The lawmakers cite the Clintons' failed attempt at reform in 1993 and even George Bush's defeat in trying to privatize Social Security as precedents for going slowly or, more accurately, glacially in expanding health-care coverage.

Under a Democratic President, we will likely get the expansion of SCHIP coverage that Bush vetoed and more funding for stem cell research, but not much else.

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus predicts an uphill battle on health-care reform. “If they try to solve all the problems," he says, "it’s going to be difficult." And possibly unhealthy for their campaigns in the next election cycle.

Casting Call for GOP "Christmas Carol"

Looking for redemption in Bush's final year, the White House Art Players might plan a new production of the Dickens classic starring the President as a kinder, gentler Scrooge.

A Nixon impersonator would be perfect for Jacob Marley, dragging the chains of Watergate, to open W's eyes with visits from the ghost of Christmas past (a Reagan lookalike as Fezziwig) Christmas present (Mitch McConnell or any endangered Senate colleague) and Mike Huckabee as Christmas future in the Republican graveyard.

On Christmas morning, a new Bush would awaken with SCHIP insurance for Tiny Tim, a veto-proof new signing pen to show Nancy Pelosi and a symbolic fruitcake to send to his new best friend, Ahmadinejad.

They could ask Dick Cheney to understudy the lead, if he promises not to shoot any of the other actors.