As Jane announced earlier, the Blue America PAC, along with several other blogs/groups, is stepping into the breach to try to push the SCHIP votes over the top for a veto override. Why? Because America’s children deserve actual care, and not a bunch of pandering, hollow words of faux compassion and little, to no, real action from George Bush other than a big, fat “no help for you.”
The Bush veto of the bipartisan compromise SCHIP bill was as cynical a political maneuver as they come — pandering to the worst elements of his wingnutty-conservative base while throwing common sense and decency out with the bathwater. As Howie says, these are the Dems in need of a serious nudge:
– Jim Marshall (D-GA)–Washington, D.C. Office (202)225-6531; Macon, GA Office 1-877-464-0255; Tifton, GA Office (229)556-7418.
– Baron Hill (D-IN)–Washington, D.C. Office (202)225-5315; Jeffersonville, IN Office (812)288-3999; Bloomington, IN Office (812)336-3000.
– Gene Taylor (D-MS)–Washington, D.C. Office (202)225-5772; Bay St. Louis, MS Office (228)469-9235; Gulfport, MS Office (228)864-7670; Ocean Springs, MS Office (228)872-7950; Hattiesburg, MS Office (601)582-3246; Laurel, MS Office (601)425-3905.
– Bob Etheridge (D-NC)–Washington, D.C. Office (202)225-4531; Raleigh, NC Office (919)829-9122 or 1-888-262-6202; Lillington, NC Office (910)814-0335 or 1-866-384-3743.
– Mike McIntyre (D-NC) –Washington, D.C. Office (202)225-2731; Lumberton, NC Office (910)735-0610; Fayetteville, NC Office (910)323-0260; Wilmington, NC Office (910)815-4959; Bolivia, NC Office (910)253-0158.
If you live in the district of any of these members of Congress, please contact them and tell them to vote for SCHIP and the kids who need healthcare in their districts. Chris Bowers at OpenLeft runs the numbers on all of this, and John Amato at Crooks and Liars is asking for your help as well.
As Digby says:
There’s a lot of talk these days, and books being written, about what it means to be a majority party Democrat living under the Big Tent. It requires coalition building and compromise and negotiation, for sure. But there are some issues that are so fundamental to what being a Democrat is, by definition, that if you don’t support them, you aren’t one. Health care for kids is one of those things — it’s simply not negotiable.
If you can spare a donation, we’d sure appreciate it for Blue America PAC. Any amount — from $5 to $500 and up – can help with this, as we try and push this forward. The DCCC is doing calls for Republicans who failed to vote the will of their constituencies on this. We didn’t think these DINOs should be left out.
Howie put together a list of targeted GOP House members. The vote on SCHIP is scheduled for October 18th. Please contact these folks between now and then and voice your support for SCHIP. We’ll be doing more on this as the week goes on, but I wanted to give everyone a heads up as to who needs an extra nudge. More from the LA Times, the Charlotte Observer, and the WaPo. The NYTimes has a patently offensive take, calling SCHIP a “wedge issue” for Democrats — no, sorry, it’s a moral issue for at risk children with bi-partisan support. Try again. Especially when you have folks like John Dingell weighing in that a veto-override is possible — we have momentum to build on with this, and we ought to use every bit of it to push health care for these children through.
Beerfart Liberal got a great LTE into the Orlando Sentinal on the issue — kudos! (And remember, you can send yours in as well — here are some helpful hints – every letter counts on this one, gang.) And Bill Scher has the rundown on the weekend GOP lie fest on the talking head shows — useful information here.
(Photo via DownWithTyranny. Too perfect.)
Related posts:
- Does House Health Care Bill Eliminate SCHIP?
- Won’t Someone Think Of The Children?
- Brave Conservatives Battle to Rescue Your Children from Obama’s Sinister Cult of Learning
- Blue America Launches New TV Initiative in Arkansas — And We Need You
- Liveblogging the House Rules Committee: HR 3962, Affordable Health Care for America Act
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Zed?
gasp!
single digits?
Redd Hedd!
SCHIP!!! Christy!!! Social Justice!!!
(Hi Bob S!) (and YDJ)!
Per Digby on the Big Tent:
We recently had a cold bucket of water in the face demonstration of that this year in Hawaii when a homophobic Republican legislator decided to become a Democrat in order to get a subcommittee chairmanship. The progressive community was up in arms, but it turns out that there are no requirements to become a Democrat here in Hawaii other than that you can’t campaign for Republicans.
What I hope is that we can reel some of these folks (like the Bush Democrats) from the margins to the main action rather than alienating them, and without moving the center of gravity of the main action more than a millimeter. But that point of view can be sorely tested by some of the driftwood that washes up on our beach.
Bob in HI
hi Laura.
hey Bob.
State CHIP!!
I hope we’ve got lots of Firepups in NC, IN, MS & GA! Those dems (Are they Bush Dems?) need some serious (but polite) nudging!
bobschacht @ 4
yeah, like they can either come aboard with us and the rest of america …
OR
… they can see how it goes clinging to those scraps of driftwood from the wreckage of all that fails to be progressive.
think or swim.
‘Take this President away, we can’t use him anymore’
;>)
Bob — Be sure to read the whole post from Digby. One of the Dems on the list is in a Katrina area that has been utterly devastated — what are the odds that a whole lot of the families in his district desperately need a helping hand until they can get back on their feet?
darkblack @ 8
Eeeeewww! Take him away, he’s made a huge stinky mess!
FunnyDiva
Funnydiva2002 @ 10
karma police
darkblack @ 8
Standing O for DarkBlack!
darkblack @ 8
Is that Vitter in the flag shirt and Depends? *s
Christy Hardin Smith @ 9
What are the odds? !00%. I suspect most are of the wrong racial persuasion. Gene Taylor is happy to screw them.
yellowdog jim @ 11
OR
(cough!)
Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door
all apologies
aHEM.
knockin’ on heaven’s door
On Fri. I did call 2 Southern dems offices in DC. Can’t remember who the first one was, but his aide told me there wasn’t a big enough piece of the pie for their state and most of the money would go to big urban areas.
The 2nd guy I spoke to to was an aide for the Mississippi rep, Gene Taylor. This guy talked to me for a long time and was really charming. He said Rep Taylor was a democratic pol in a poor, rural, southern, red state and in order to stay in power and counter the GOP meme he really had to make politics local. He feels the cigarette tax is regressive and has gotten lots of calls from constituents saying they wouldn’t be able to afford their cigs. Often children could be heard crying in the background as these people complained about losing their only pleasure in life. According to this aide, MS is not a big tobacco state. So it’s not the tobacco companies he’s afraid of offending. If the money came from somewhere else, he would vote for Schip. Don’t know if this was BS but I believed him to the bottom of my heart.
darkblack @ 8
OMG…707, 707!!!
Let’s see now. $12,000,000,000 per month for the Bush wars and occupation. But we can’t afford SCHIP.
So I called my rep, and talked to her Legislative Ass. I derided the excuse given, and pointed out the fluff pieces my rep does support as opposed to the meaty issues she ignores (didn’t vote on SCHIP). I blame myself, because now my rep is dead (JoAnn Davis, R-Pinheads).
No child left behind. Left behind for what? Oh and don’t forget another of the Bush frauds: Compassionate conservatism.
Adding to the phone numbers in the post, here are fax numbers. You can send a fax right now!
Jim Marshall 202 225 3013
Baron Hill 202 226 6866
Gene Taylor 202 225 7074
Bob Etheridge 202 225 5662
Mike McIntyre 202 225 5773
On the issue of health care for all. Who would you trust to get the job done? Edwards or Clinton?
I agree with everybody yelling about what a crock this is and how cold-hearted bush* and his minions are but I think I see right through their antics.
These people are playing HIGH STAKES p*ker. Their goal is to shift the focus away from the hearings into their criminality and all of their FU’s to Congress.
This is the action of a skilled and practiced bully. When the rabid crowd gets too close to a sensitive spot, p*ke ‘em with a sharp stick, change the focus, make them talk about something else.
Heard anything new about the USA scandal?
What about the subpoenas?
The Blackwater hearings were in the news… for about two days.
The SCHIP is taking all of the political oxygen out of the room. Yes, it is outrageous, it does reveal all the corporate initiatives the repig’s are famous for, but look at what they’ve done.
They’ve changed the subject!!!
Edited ** and released by MOD
Ill Do Chay at 20 — I saw that over the weekend. She had a difficult bout with breast cancer…
It may be true that their only pleasure in life is smoking … but a lot of people in Mississippi are pretty much living on federal aid because of poverty. Has he done anything to get money from those wealthy (probably white) folks with their shiny new condos built with Katrina funding? Maybe they need to have their taxes raised.
As for the argument that has been coming up more and more often from politicians, about ’sending more money to DC than we get back’: where does it say, anywhere, that you should get back in services exactly the amount that you paid in taxes? Wealthier states pay for services to the poorer ones, because it benefits everyone. Otherwise everyone in the poorer states – and most of them are ‘red’ states or in the deep south – would have moved to wealthier states decades ago. Then you move that argument to county level, and the poorer counties in a state get the shaft, because the wealthier ones use the same argument … and on down the line. I call BS, and say that it’s covered by ‘as you do to the least of these’, which every f*cking politician using this as an argument should know and should have thrown back in his, her, or its teeth. [/rant]
(FWIW – I have cousins in areas where tobacco was about the only paying crop they could grow. I have sympathy, but no good advice. And any more, most of the tobacco seems to be going to other countries.)
Does the DLC have a position on SCHIP?
Yep, Christy. Apparently sha had some success, but then some pretty recent (last month or so) losses. I felt kind of bad, because I was taking no guff from the aide and I was kind of hot & bothered. Then a few days later, front page news.
The most important issues in our house are global warming, war, health care, education and accountability (justice).
bobschacht @ 6
I wonder if Robin Hayes can be moved [Republican list] based on his being in a tough election challenge from Larry Kissell, who only lost by 300 votes last November. The Dems there are highly motivated. North Carolina, let’s see some action!
Oct. 15, 2007 issue – Neocons can’t help but slink around Washington, D.C. The Iraq War has given the neoconservatives—who favor the assertive use of American power abroad to spread American values—something of a bad name, and several of the Republican candidates seem less than eager to hire them as advisers. But Rudy Giuliani apparently never got that memo. One of the top foreign-policy consultants to the leading GOP candidate is Norman Podhoretz, a founding father of the neocon movement.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21…../newsweek/
Oklahoma kiddo @ 30
somehow I’m not surprised.
Deliver us from this evil.
In a little more than a year from now we will have a new president. Takes the breath away. Will this new leader really, really care about health care for our kids?
Oklahoma kiddo @ 32
John Edwards would care
OK. I called and left TMs for all of them.Any dempol who would vote against healthcare for poor children needs to be removed from office. Now for a modest donation to ACT BLUE.
A glimmer of hope?
A Nobel Candidate
Thousands of activists are hoping to convince Al Gore to run for president. Could a Nobel Peace Prize give the reluctant candidate a push?
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21…../newsweek/
egregious @ 30
It would seem that my state, NC, might be a key, or a cog in the wheel, to passage of SCHIP. This is a tobacco growing state, and the dems who oppose this bill are likely opposed to it because paying for it will come from a tobacco tax.
Dem Reps in the house opposing the bill come from the eastern part of the state, prime tobacco growing country. They are afraid that their constituents way of making a living will be impacted, as are their prospects for re-election.
Sorry to say this is so, but until they look at the common good, as opposed to the narrow local good, this is not likely to change, Dem, or Repub.
Interesting. TPM references the calls to the five Dems on their front page, linking to an article at TPM election central by Greg Sargent. Greg’s article names Jane, but not fdl. I don’t think Josh Marshall has ever directly referred to fdl or our proprieters at TPM’s front page. Maybe I’m wrong, on that, but I know that over the years those folks have gotten scads of info from this site, and nary a hat-tip.
Politicians have no health care worries for themselves or their family. Can you imagine being able to wake up each morning and not have to worry about medicine or medical care for your child? Must be nice.
That post about the military now supporting Dems in the hopes that they will end the war in Iraq NOW, rather than in some indefinite future decade …
Add them to the families who are desperate for health care, whether for adults, children, or both …
Add the people — now apparently even old-style conservatives — who would like to see the power unConstitutionally arrogated by the Elected Absolute Monarch, er, POTUS returned to the baskets from whence it came …
Put together slates of candidates with these issues as their platform …
I think you’ve got yourself a party that would win a plurality these days.
Call it The Progressives, if you like.
You might have a majority by the time voting rolls around.
Oklahoma kiddo @ 36
Whether he wins the Nobel Peace Prize or not, if Gore was not planning to run, surely he would have made an announcement telling his fans to stop spending their money on him. He has not done that. It seems strange to me that he would stand by and watch people dump their hard-earned money and time for no reason, just “in case” he wins the prize. For that very reason, I have real hope that he’s gonna run.
Baron Hill is impervious to his constituent’s views. I say this as someone that has lobbied him in his office in Washington, been in continued contact with his office in Bloomington and via his Washington office via email. I made phone calls to GoTV during the 2006 general election after contacting his campaign and making it very clear that constituent service would be paramount to my continued support. When I contact him earlier this year about the Hinchey-Rohrbacher amendment to the DoJ appropriations bill I reminded his staff of my work to help Hill return to Congress (he’d been defeated in 2004) and that he had to be more responsive and to vote the right way. He responded to my emails 3 months after voting against my position with a form letter.
He needs to have strong Democratic primary competition and be retired by being defeated in the primary. In terms of voting he is no different from the Bush Republican he replaced (and his likely rematch in 2008 if he wins the primary) Mike Sodrel. The only difference is that Sodrel will speak out in favor of bad policy, while Hill will simply vote for bad policy.
I’ll be working with the Democratic party in Bloomington/Monroe county to ensure Hill is opposed by a strong candidate.
Hill deserves the opprobrium he gets as a Bush Dog. Ignoring any constituent is bad. Ignoring people that did voluntary work to return him to Congress is inexcusable.
http://www.lefttoonlane.com/20…..e-dog.html
pretty much sums up what needs to be done with Hill (and other blue dogs?)
Christy Hardin Smith @ 9
Christy,
I did go and read the whole post from Digby, and I am not disagreeing with you, or her. My lament is that our Democratic Party in Hawaii does not seem to consider that there are ANY “issues that are so fundamental to what being a Democrat is, by definition, that if you don’t support them, you aren’t one.” And our party here in Hawaii welcomed this homophobic refugee from the Republican Party, if not with open arms, at least through gritted teeth.
Some local politics involving competing factions within the Democratic Party are at work here, that are not all that different from the national scene. Suppose, for example, that Trent Lott didn’t want to be stuck with being a “Ranking Member” for the rest of his legislative life, and announced that he wanted to join the Democratic Party, meeting privately with Steny Hoyer and leaders of the DLC about possible committee or subcommittee chairmanships if he were to switch.
Bob in HI
darkblack @ 8
Perfect! Also reminds that ‘we’, NOT ‘him’ are in the position of ‘usage’.
I am against this bill. Taxing cigarrette smokers unfairly for a habit most of them can’t stop is wrong and a weak way to fund this bill. A significant number of smokers are people on the low end of the wage scale. If they want this to be a sin tax, tax alcoholic beverages. This would be more fair to a wider range of people and probably bring in more revenue in the long run. Help smokers by funding meaningful programs to quit the habit.
Most of all, use this energy to force the congress to bring a universal healthcare program that everyone can afford to ALL AMERICANS! I am sick and tired of “family legislation” always offered from both sides of the isle that favor families only. As a single person I am sick and tired of my tax dollars going to fund tax breaks and various benefits for breeders only and single people like myself are constantly left out of many of these so called benefits. Tax breaks and tax increases should benefit everyone egually regardless of their family status.
marshen @ 45
That smoke tax is the argument my rep’s rep used for supporting the veto. Here’s the thing – you are asking for a complete loss instead of a partial success. On top of that, legislation can be modified in the next Congress. The funding source can be changed. But pitching the entire bill now leaves people to die.
Take the partial success (needy kids get insurance) and deal with the part you don’t like (smoker tax) later. If you don’t believe me, go read some bill texts. Many many of them are ‘changed text’ only bills.
Oklahoma kiddo @ 27
What? Didn’t you hear we all have universal health care already? Hillary provided it in 1993!
You say “No”? Oh, sorry, never mind.
Well, at least Hillary got lots of campaign contributions out of that trick.
It seems likely they’ll keep playing the issue the same way Hillary Clinton has, meaning they’ll keep threatening to provide health care, but hold off so long as the health care industry keeps forking over campaign contributions.
They might let Hillary sign SCHIP into law or some amendment to it, to make it look like she’s Moses signing the ten commandments or something. But, as for major reform, don’t look for that before her second term.
At least that’s the “plan”. Now whether they LET her have a second term isn’t clear. If they can prevent health care reform in her first term and then deny her second term…
Dig it! I call BULSHIT on Mel Martinez!!! LOL!
I’ve posted these links before but I’m gonna keep doing it. The first one is to a webpage and the second one is to a specific link there. The second one is a bit of an upload but you can see just how full of shit they are on this.
http://www.kff.org/
http://www.kff.org/medicaid/upload/7675.pdf
You’ll see there that half the increase in uninsured kids in 2006 came in “middle class” families. It’s just good stuff, good info. How to turn it into sound bites so that people listen?
I really gotta use the spellchecker. When I misspell “bullshit” as I did above, it’s time for bed.
(I used it to make sure I didn’t misspell “misspell.”)
We’re working on McIntyre from Wilmington, NC:
From the Wilmington StarNews Link to article…
BTW – I haven’t done it yetso I don’t wanna tell people what to do, but when talking with Baron Hill, ya might wanna point out that his state’s senators (Bayh & Lugar, 1 Dem 1 repub) both voted FOR SCHIP. Why’d they do that if it’s so bad for Indiana? What makes him so friggin’ smart?
One point I didn’t make about Baron Hill – his predecessor was a fine congressman – Lee Hamilton. Now the district has been somewhat gerrymandered since Lee was my representative (I was represented by Frank McCloskey/John Hostettler for several terms).
The McCloskey/Hostettler contests were very competitive with Frank being seated after a recount by the House after the House refused to accept the recount done by the Indiana Secretary of State. many of the precincts in that race are now in Hill’s district.
Hill’s races have been very close. He’s not a particularly strong candidate and a real democratic candidate could change the district for the better. Hill isn’t a strong candidate and he doesn’t represent democratic values.
We need a new Lee Hamilton for our district.