This is one of those stories that has to be passed on as far and as wide as possible, but it really makes you wonder if some of these partisan, win-at-all-costs Republicans are actually some different species or something. Think Progress has done the work on this, so I'll just excerpt from them:
If it weren’t for CHIP, I might not be here today. … We got the help we needed because we had health insurance for us through the CHIP program. But there are millions of kids out there who don’t have CHIP, and they wouldn’t get the care that my sister and I did if they got hurt. … I just hope the President will listen to my story and help other kids to be as lucky as me.
Now, you know what's coming - you just might not believe it. The right wing attack machine has, in response, gone after this kid and his family. And we're not just talking about a few easily dissmissable nutjobs here (although the smear did begin with an anonymous wingnut at freerepublic.com), the attack has been picked up and amplified by The National Review, Michelle Malkin, Wizbang, Powerline, the Weekly Standard blog, and House GOP leader John Boehner - and the attacks have crept into ABC's online site as well. The message is, as TP put it, "that Frost was actually a rich kid being pampered by the government" and that "Graeme and his sister Gemma attend wealthy schools that cost 'nearly $40,000 per year for tuition' and live in a well-off home"
The real message - given the above attacks and reports that the family is getting a barrage of harassing phone calls, and have picked up Michelle Malkin as a stalker into their private lives - is basically; don't open your mouth and screw with us or we'll come after you. Any conservative with any kind of conscience should damn well get out in front and condemn this twisted smear and intimidation campaign.
Here are the facts about the family, for the record:
1) Graeme has a scholarship to a private school. The school costs $15K a year, but the family only pays $500 a year.
2) His sister Gemma attends another private school to help her with the brain injuries that occurred due to her accident. The school costs $23,000 a year, but the state pays the entire cost.
3) They bought their “lavish house” sixteen years ago for $55,000 at a time when the neighborhood was less than safe.
4) Last year, the Frost’s made $45,000 combined. Over the past few years they have made no more than $50,000 combined.
5) The state of Maryland has found them eligible to participate in the CHIP program.
Desperate to defend Bush’s decision to cut off millions of children from health care, the right wing has stooped to launching baseless and uninformed attacks against a 12 year old child and his family.
The in-the-works "State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP)" bill which would famously expand health insurance coverage to children nationwide, also now stands to protect Vermont children from a Bush administration rule change which would deny Dr. Dynasaur coverage to thousands of Vermont children. From a joint press release from the offices of Leahy, Sanders and Welch (emphasis added):
Using SCHIP funds, Vermont’s Dr. Dynasaur program now offers comprehensive health coverage to children from households with incomes up to 300 percent of poverty -- $61,950 for a family of four. Eleven other states also offer coverage to kids from middle-income families. The legislation will cover an additional 4 million children nationwide – several thousand more in Vermont -- on top of the 6 million currently in the program. It will also sideline a pending Bush Administration rule change, announced Aug. 17, that threatens to cut coverage for millions of kids now covered under SCHIP. That change would tighten restrictions on states like Vermont that cover children above 250 percent of the federal poverty level. In Vermont, the new rules would mean more than 2000 kids would lose their health coverage.
The bill also heads off, at least for six months, another recently announced Bush Administration rule change that would prohibit states from using Medicaid funds for rehab services for K-12 students with disabilities, which would put Vermont on the hook for potentially another $20 million per year.
As has been widely covered, Bush is making a show of his intention to veto the bill (well, unless fellow Republican and Bush state campaign Chair Jim Douglas can use his election-touted clout with the administration to get him to consider...to consider...oh never mind, I'm cracking up even as I type it...). Based on recent history, one would expect that he will veto it, and Congresional Democrats will just mope ineffectively in response (that'll show him).
There is some talk, however, of pushing on this bill the way many of us wanted to see the Iraq withdrawal-deadline bill pushed - simply passing it over and over again until he is either shamed into passing it, or enough Republicans are shamed into voting to override. We'll see...
250-1
55-1
