White House Catches Nancy Pelosi in a Lie
Democrat leader misleads on SCHIP
By Bluey Posted in Congress — Comments (15) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Caucus Chairman Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.) spent the day spinning President Bush's veto of the $35-billion expansion of SCHIP. In some cases, uneducated reporters failed to question their outrageous assertions. Fortunately, Republicans aren't letting the Democrats get away with it.
Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Va.) left Emanuel speechless during a TV debate this afternoon. And when I asked Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.) if Emanuel would successfully woo 15 Republicans to override the veto, Pence said his Democrat colleague was blowing smoke. "I think he’s talking through his hat," Pence said.
Now I'm pleased to see the White House is challenging Pelosi on three misleading statements she made about SCHIP today.
1) Pelosi said he bill is "just enrolling all of the children who are eligible" and not "expanding an eligibility" for SCHIP. That's a bald-faced lie, according to the White House.
• There are hundreds of thousands of children eligible for SCHIP under current law who are not signed up for the program. SCHIP was created to cover children in families with annual incomes at or below 200 percent of the Federal poverty level.
• Congress' bill explicitly rejects a requirement that 95 percent of eligible children from families with incomes under 200 percent of the poverty level must be enrolled in SCHIP before children in higher-income families can be covered.
• Congress' bill would also allow SCHIP to cover children in some households with incomes of up to $83,000 per year – 400 percent of the Federal poverty level.
Continued on the jump ...
2) Pelosi said the bill was "about private medicine." Yeah right, says the White House.
• Under Congress' plan, one out of every three additional children moving onto government coverage would be moving from private insurance. Of the approximately 6 million enrollees Congress' legislation would attract by 2012, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projects that 2 million would drop private insurance to enroll.
• The policies of the government ought to be helping people get private insurance, not Federal coverage. That's why the President believes strongly in Association Health Plans to help small business owners better afford insurance for their workers and believes we ought to change the Federal tax code to help individuals better afford insurance in the marketplace.
3) Pelosi said Bush "missed an opportunity to say to the children of America, your health and well-being are important to us." She obviously didn't listen close enough.
• Today, President Bush reiterated his strong support for SCHIP. THE PRESIDENT: "I strongly support the program. I like the idea of helping those who are poor be able to get health coverage for their children. I supported it as governor, and I support it as President of the United States."
• This year, the Administration will spend about $35.5 billion to provide health insurance for poor children through Medicaid. THE PRESIDENT: "In other words, when they say, 'Well, poor children aren't being covered in America,' if that's what you're hearing on your TV screens, I'm telling you there's $35.5 billion worth of reasons not to believe that."
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White House Catches Nancy Pelosi in a Lie 15 Comments (0 topical, 15 editorial, 0 hidden) Post a comment »
The House GOP, which (as I understand it) is the group that we're all expecting to really kill this S-CHIP bill by sustaining the President's veto, shouldn't have to bear the PR burden by itself.
Especially since the President's bully pulpit is the best mechanism for making the case why this veto was justified.
If the White House doesn't get out and fight, long and hard, then I wouldn't blame the House GOP if they felt that Dubya had left them holding the bag.
Mr. President, we gave you that pulpit---twice---because we expect you to use it. Now is the time, sir.
"Who will stand/On either hand/And guard this bridge with me?" (Macaulay)
It makes me sick to my stomach to see that Democrats are trying to accuse the President of not caring for the children.
Courage becomes a living and an attractive virtue when it is regarded not only as a willingness to die manfully, but also as a determination to live decently.
...but the numbers say this is a LOSING issue for us, the same way the BetrayUs ad was a big loser for the Jacka**es.
Fact is, the Dems did the legwork of priming the public for the SCHIP vote, and Bush walked right into it. Right or wrong, we just handed them a nice fat truncheon for the coming cycle. We can wail all day about catching them in lies and misleading nonsense, and it will all be true, but it's not bumper sticker stuff for us while it's an easy one for them. Strategically, our best bet now is to circle back around and try to outflank them on something we own. This ain't it.
Yes, it IS an unreasonable expansion of an already massive fed program and a further slide into bureaucratically-rationed health care, but our mistake was in letting it get this far to begin with.
We've got at least 2 congressmen here in Texas who are already getting HAMMERED for this - probably more - and they were on vulnerable margins to begin with.
Be nice or i'll slap you cross-eyed!
- Granny
Well said. I would agree with your points. Although wasn't SCHIP proposed and voted into existance in 1997 by a Republican congress? You could potentially add the fact that Republicans had set themselves up for this a long long time ago.
However this can be framed to our Advantage. This can become about smaller government and bigger government. It can be about new taxes or self sufficiency. The Dems play on the easiest emotions and those usually win but not always. Reps need to sharpen their debating points. This can still turn into a winner for the Reps.
"The nine most terrifying words in the English language are 'I'm from the government and I'm here to help'"
Ronald Reagan
"Difficulty is the excuse history never accepts."
Edward R. Murrow
Perhaps re-framing the arguement might have worked ten years ago but currently the war is dominating the public's thoughts and so when the President requests 200 billion a year to fund the war, small government and low taxes is not a believable pitch. in comparison 35 Billion over 7 years is nothing. Plus you can not argue against the health of children, no matter how much of spin it might be it is a marketing winner all the way.
but conducting a war is the job of the federal government. Providing health insurance to "children", ANY of them, is not.
I'd be just tickled pink to see the Dems make a HUGE issue of this and let the program go the way of the assault weapons ban. Let them hold out for all $35B and let the veto be upheld and let the damn program die.
And, I don't care how many broken hearted parents they parade in front of the ABC cameras.
____
CongressCritter™: Never have so few felt like they were owed so much by so many for so little.
Hold their feet to the fire. This should be the easiest issue in the world for Republicans to unify on.
Let. It. Die.
and one we should have been fighting for a long time.
If entitlements are to be restrained, we have to start somewhere.
I understand we're getting hammered in the PR war now. But, we haven't begun to fight on our side. Now, if we refuse to mount a passionate fight for our position, we'll deserve to get creamed. ("New Tone" Bush 43 White House, did you hear that?)
But, I'm not ready to concede that Americans are so shallow as to consciously choose to support an inflated entitlement, once all the facts are laid out before them. Right now, they're mostly hearing the spin from Team Pelosi.
Now, if the American people hear both sides, and STILl choose an inflated entitlement...well, then we conservatives have some hearts-and-minds work to do.
"Who will stand/On either hand/And guard this bridge with me?" (Macaulay)
take a lesson from how the Dems skittered away from MoveOn last week: they knew they were in a bad spot (I can hear Steny doing George Clooney in Oh Brother Where Art Thou: "Damn! We're in a tight spot boys!"): they went ahead and let the vote happen so they could put it behind them. That doesn't mean we should just roll over and help the Dems jump the veto, but we certainly should get this behind us because fighting health insurancve for KIDS is a PR nightmare.
We have to take on entitlements somewhere else - maybe reviving the welfare queen images, abuse, fraud - those can work again - but dragging out this fight is only going to do more damage. It's just a fact that we missed the boat; all they need to do is throw out that "$200 Billion/year for the war vs. $35 billion/7 years for CHILDREN" and we're toast.
Five years ago we it would have been a very different story but the calculus is not in our favor on this now. I'm encouraged that Bush is fighting with some strong and coherent arguments (I wish he'd done it long ago) but by waiting until we're on the defensive to start using his big guns he's already ceded the high ground. We need to pull back and move to a battleground of our choosing, because right now we're wasting effort attacking them on theirs.
Be nice or i'll slap you cross-eyed!
- Granny
to fight on. But, it IS ground worth defending.
And, after the veto holds, the WH can help itself by not just dropping the matter and hoping people will forget. You're right---they won't. But, if the WH makes an ongoing effort to explain why the veto was the right thing to do, they should sway some opinions out there.
The key is, for voters NOT to hold a grudge over S-CHIP. A firm AND SUSTAINED PR offensive should help in that regard.
"Who will stand/On either hand/And guard this bridge with me?" (Macaulay)
...long enough for the heat to blow over. While Bush and the rest of us are putting our best arguments forward, we're really just in damage-control mode right now.
Yes, there's always the (significant) probability that the Dems over-reach and over-dramatize this - to some extent they already are, but they've found a big winner so they're riding it all the way to the Ponderosa.
Once passions cool and the campaign season shifts into high gear, they'll sharpen their skewers again for targeted Congressional seats and this veto will be a big thrust of their efforts. Many swing voters will hold this as a grudge regardless, but if we let them wail it out right now and play it straight, we can still come off looking like principled dissenters next year. If we expend too much energy and air time defending the veto now, I'm afraid we'd burn bridges with more voters than we can afford at this point. I wish I was as confident as some of you seem to be in the target voters' ability to reason and look long and hard at the facts, but, hey, I'm a consultant....
Be nice or i'll slap you cross-eyed!
- Granny
Catching a democrat in a lie is a "dog bites man" sort of story, as unremarkable as Notre Dame losing in football this fall. (Ok, low blow :) ).
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Instead of playing punching bag, there is life. Who knew.
They are running nonsense whiny commercials down here in south Florida lying about what the bill is about and blaming Bush for "hurting the children".