A Good Use Of The Veto Pen

Today, President George W. Bush did something he hardly ever does ... he vetoed a spending bill. Of course, like everything this President does, he will be criticized in the press and the Democrats will try to make political fodder out of it, but let's take a closer look at this bill and see why he vetoed it.

The bill is HR 976 and its' purpose is to amend Title XXI of the Social Security Act. It was designed to be the largest expansion of health insurance coverage for children since Medicaid was started in the 1960's. The bill increased the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) by $35,000,000,000.00 (35 Billion ... I just think that all the zeros bring the cost of this program into better perspective), over the next 5 years. Currently, children in families with incomes up to 200 percent of the poverty level. HR 976 would expand coverage to families making 300 percent of the poverty level ($62,000.00 for a family of 4), and certain states would be able to enact legislation expanding the coverage to families making up to $83,000.00.

Obviously, a family with an income of $83K is not exactly wallowing in poverty, so why are our tax dollars going to be used to help provide insurance for their kids? Sure, medical insurance is expensive ... but for someone making that kind of money it becomes a choice. A lot of times that choice becomes a more expensive car instead of a health plan. Since this is a free country, I have nothing to say about a stupid choice like that (well maybe a little), but I Do Not want my taxes to pay for his choice. And $62K a year is pretty much the same thing. What this bill will do is get people to drop their current (more expensive) health insurance and switch to the Government sponsored insurance program. You can't blame the folks for taking a good deal when it's offered to them, but you can blame a Government that is more interested in finding a way to expand government dependence, then maybe finding a way to lower the cost of current health insurance.

I actually read all 109 pages of this extremely confusing bill (I may have understood 20 of the pages). I must say, I consider myself of at least average intelligence, so our Congressional Representatives must all be members of MENSA and pure geniuses to craft and understand this bill ... even when their appearances on News programs makes them seem dull-witted, they must just be trying to relate to us average people in their constituencies.

A lot of stuff has been said about this bill extending SCHIP to illegal alien children, but try as I might, I could not find anything in it that said it would. Actually, on page 93, Section 605, entitled, "No Federal Funding For Illegal Aliens", this statement is made in fairly precise and understandable English, "Nothing in this Act allows Federal payment for individuals who are not legal residents". This statement is actually amazingly clear ... especially since it was sandwiched between a couple of sections full of legal gobbledy gook. Luckily, I'm a rather trusting fella that takes everything at face value. If I wasn't, I would realize that there is also nothing in this bill that prohibits the individual states from extending SCHIP to illegal immigrants and using federal dollars to help offset this extra expense by using more federal money to cover legal residents.

My least favorite part of this bill is the way they want to pay for this expansion. They want to double the tobacco tax. This is just great for all you non-smokers, but I smoke two packs a day and this would be an increase in the taxes that I personally pay. This proposed tax of $0.61 per pack translates into $482.03 a year after I add in the extra state sales tax of 8.25%. Back in June, the state of Texas, in order to lower our school property tax, increased the tobacco tax by $1.00 a pack. This now costs me $790.22 a year. My property tax went down, but the appraised value of my property went up $18,500.00 and then the school district increased the rate $0.17 per $100.00 in valuation. After the dust cleared, I am now paying $386.52 more than before the "property tax cut". The key question that I am trying to get to (besides complaining about my trials and tribulations) is why are we constantly putting the burden of extra taxes on smokers? Could it be that tobacco users are an easy target since they only comprise roughly 18% of the population? This is actually a regressive tax since the smoking rate is higher for those with lower incomes and the higher the income, the lower the smoking rate ... how does this play with the "Tax The Rich" class?

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