Following is a sample of reactions to the SCHIP veto as political football, including reactions from two hospital executives:
"My hope is this will not be used simply as a political football....We should get down to the business of insuring low-income kids and cut out some of the posturing."
--Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tx) quoted in "Cornyn feeling heat after CHIP vote," The Dallas Morning News, Oct. 5, 2007
"It's unfortunate. The CHIP bill is caught up in the partisan debate, a rhetorical debate, really, about the future of health care in this country.... It really should be considered for what it is, an opportunity to cover more kids."
--Karen Crompton, executive director of Voices for Utah Children, quoted in "Analysis: Bush veto puts proposed expansion of kids' health insurance in peril," The Salt Lake Tribune, Oct. 5, 2007
"Republicans have a reasonable policy argument against the measure, but it sounds complex and abstract....The Democratic argument is simple and strong: 'We want to help kids but Bush and his friends do not.'"
--John Pitney, political science professor, Claremont McKenna College, quoted in "Bush's SCHIP veto could hurt Republicans," Atlanta Journal Constitution, Oct 3
“If they need a little more money in the bill to help us meet the objective of getting help for poor children, I'm more than willing to sit down with the leaders and find a way to do so.”
--President George Bush, quoted in "Political spin in overdrive over SCHIP," The Missoulian, Oct. 6
And leave it to healthcare executives to put things in perspective:
“Unfortunately, that just puts a further burden on the health care system in having to absorb those costs....The fact of the matter is that one of the big costs in health care is the costs to help the uninsured.”
--Mike Scialdone, CFO, Penrose-St. Francis Health Services, Colorado Springs
“What we think SCHIP does...is it encourages those kids to get into our system earlier, hopefully preventing a more serious or traumatic event down the road.... We don’t feel like politics should interfere in providing medical services, really to anybody but particularly to children.”
--John Suits, associate administrator of business and government affairs, Memorial Hospital, Colorado Springs. Scialdone and Suits are quoted in "Health firms push for veto override," Colorado Springs Gazette, Oct 6
