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DEL.ICIO.USBlogwatch: Sonny Perdue and an SCHIP rerun
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Blogger Amy Morton of Georgia Women Vote caught an interesting rerun the other day.
It was a look by the PBS news magazine “Now” at the federal-state program to provide health insurance for children, known nationally as SCHIP and locally as PeachCare.
Don’t feel bad if you missed it the first time it aired back in July — as we did. The program is broadcast locally at 2:30 p.m. each Sunday.
This particular program looked at two children, both from Georgia. One was a teenaged girl with Type 1 diabetes — the kind of diabetes that requires an insulin pump and such. Her father had been laid off, and efforts to get on PeachCare were useless — it was accepting no new clients, because of the fight over the program in Washington.
Gov. Sonny Perdue appears at about the eight-minute mark, and comes across a bit prickly. He’s asked what he would tell the young girl.
Says Perdue:
“We’re doing our part, and the federal part. We’re doing all that we can. To blame us for freezing a part where our federal partners are not fulfilling their obligation is not right — and I won’t accept that blame.
“We’re doing our part. You tell her to call her congressman.”
Says the reporter:
“And I’m sure if I called her and said, ‘Listen, the governor says you should call your member of Congress, she would say, ‘That’s not going to [get] me what I need to survive.’ So the next thing you would say to her would be…..”
Perdue:
“We can do no more. We’re doing the state’s portion and the federal portion. For you to take an individual and want to cast blame on the state of Georgia and me, and what would I do — what would I offer her, I do take offense to that.”
For the record, last week, the governor did put his name to a bipartisan letter urging all sides to calm down and do whatever needs to be done to keep tSCHIP/PeachCare alive.
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By Deal is worse
September 19, 2007 5:28 PM | Link to this
On the same program, Nathan Deal comes across as someone who blatantly hates working families, blaming these folks who are at least trying to do their kids right, pretty much calling them deadbeats. Nice guy you are Nathan Deal. Not everyone has a cushy gig like yours. Or your unbelievably generous government benefits. Sonny comes across as defensive; Deal comes across as mean hearted.
And this is good reading on SCHIP: http://www.gbpi.org/pubs/healthcare/20070915.pdf
Remember, $2.70 in fed money for every $1 in state money. And SCHIP helps keep emergency rooms from filling up unnecessarily.
By S Shiver
September 19, 2007 6:27 PM | Link to this
Someone who loves working families is George W. Bush. He’s our lord and saviour and I thank god every day that god has blessed us with W.’s glorious leadership for the last seven years.
By SCHIP Not a Good Deal
September 19, 2007 6:30 PM | Link to this
SCHIP is another government program that is in danger of running amok. It is a baby step towards HillaryCare. Hillary recently said that privatization “is not the answer to ANTHING.” Want to drive a government-made automobile?
As Grace-Marie Turner says “‘It’s for the children.’ In American politics, that phrase is a catch-all justification for spending more tax dollars on any government program. After all, who doesn’t want to help needy kids?”
Note that 14 states have used SCHIP to fund health care for adults and 7 states have used SCHIP funding to provide health care for families that earn 300% of the poverty level. SCHIP is HillaryCare in waiting. Nobody will oppose health care “for children”—but it doesn’t stop with “children”. Soon, government-run health care will jump from 15% of GDP to what—25% of GDP? Your standard of living will be much lower if you choose the government for this “free” health care.
More government is not the answer. This article is an alternative to the one posted earlier.
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=YWE4ZGEzOGExMmQxZmZhN2M5NzM1NjIxNzc5ZjBjMDI=
By Health care is not a right
September 19, 2007 6:40 PM | Link to this
Blogger Amy Morton wrote “I believe that access to health care is quickly becoming the great civil rights issue of our time.”
Well I believe that having a late model automobile and four-bedroom home will quickly become the next great civil rights issue of our time.
But where, oh Amy, is it government’s (pronounced “taxpayers’”) responsibility to do any of these things?
When you try to make health care a civil right, by definition you have to empower government to seize the assets of other people to pay for this alleged right. Doesn’t an individual have a “civil right” not to have the money he earns to provide for his family confiscated by the police power of government?
The answer is clear. The answer is “yes”.
Liberals always want to do something with someone else’s money.
By Amy Morton
September 19, 2007 7:30 PM | Link to this
While it is not goverment’s job to climb the ladder for people, it is the job of goverment to make sure that there is a ladder to climb. Access to education and health care are critical rungs the ladder out of poverty. And, this program is not welfare. It is a hand up for the working poor. These families pay a premium for this insurance. Yes, it is subsidized, but they also invest. It is exactly the kind of program that it makes sense to maintain and expand. We are helping those who help themselves.
And, from a purely selfish standpoint, we should do it because it costs us more not to do these things. If children don’t have access to health care, then they tend to be sick more often, miss school more often and fail to get the education they need to get a good job. If you are going to take the position that we as a community have no responsibility to one another, then you should be willing to stand at the door of the doctor’s office or at the counter of the pharmacy and turn people away-or at least to acknowledge that you don’t think they deserve help. If you think that you are responsible only to yourself and your family, then we have a fundamental disagreement. I think that in a community, we all have a responsibility to one another.
By the way, does it strike you as interesting that in the gospels Jesus went about healing the sick? Apparently, he thought it was important.
By Call me Hay Soos
September 19, 2007 10:18 PM | Link to this
Democrats will even use Jesus to justify taking one family’s income to give to another.
Now the Dems are Jesus experts. But wait, I thought they believed in the separation of Church and State.
To Dems, taxation is one of their gods (sometimes called subsidies).
Is using SCHIP to provide health care for families that earn 300% of the poverty level what Jesus would do? Hmmmm?
Another thing, when you use the word “he” when referring to Jesus, why not capitalize it? Then (some) folks will think you really know something about Jesus. (About as much as you know about health care policy.)
By S Shiver
September 19, 2007 11:18 PM | Link to this
Right on, Hay Soos.
By S Shiver
September 19, 2007 11:29 PM | Link to this
The first comment with my name is not mine. My bet, its Will Jones. Typical lib crap. Still I say, right on Hay Soos.
Will or whom ever, the knife can cut both ways. I see salvation, sanctification, and a chance your errant ways will be purified. God Bless you, my friend. God Bless You.
By SCHIP good enuff for Sonny Do
September 20, 2007 12:54 AM | Link to this
“Liberals always want to do something with someone else’s money.”
Funny, Sonny Perdue wholeheatedly supports SCHIP.
By S Shiver
September 20, 2007 1:39 AM | Link to this
If true about Sonny… disappointing, but hardly a stain on his overall record. The State is better off because of Sonny.
By Nice person that S Shiver
September 20, 2007 1:57 AM | Link to this
Yep, big stain on Sonny Do for wanting SCHIP, so the parents of working families who want to be proactive will pay something for their kids’ healthcare, not get it for free. Big stain on Sonny for wanting a sick kid to have his/her own primary care physician, and stop a small problem from becoming a huge one and not clogging ER’s. Big stain on a guy who along with his wife have been foster parents and advocated for more people to become foster parents.
Stop hating on kids, S Shiver. Go ahead, and hate on their parents for being “deadbeats”. But don’t hate on Georgia’s kids.
By joelscorp
September 20, 2007 7:31 AM | Link to this
Note to all that this NOW program can be viewed for free at the following page on the NOW website:
http://www.pbs.org/now/shows/327/
By Who is heck is S Shiver?
September 20, 2007 1:52 PM | Link to this
“If true about Sonny… disappointing”
So our Governor is trying to come up with solutions for kids without healthcare, and this S Shiver person is disappointed with him? I’ll take a governor trying to help kids anyday over a disappointed S Shiver.