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President Bush warned that Democrats are ready to raise taxes in historic proportions and reiterated his opposition to the expansion of a children’s healthcare program during his weekly radio address Saturday. The president has vowed to veto the legislation, which he opposes because it would increase spending on the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) from about $5 billion to $12 billion annually for the next five years. He did credit Congress for including the existing program in a continuing resolution that would fund the government in the absence of new appropriations bills for the new fiscal year that begins Monday. Bush took the budget argument beyond health care by hammering the Democratic-controlled Congress for spending proposals that exceed his budget requests by billions of dollars. “Unfortunately [the Democrats] seem to have chosen the path of higher spending,” Bush said in his radio address. “They have proposed spending increases that would add an extra $205 billion on top of my Administration’s budget request over the next five years. There’s only one way to pay for such a large spending increase, and that is to raise taxes on the American people.” Determined to gain leverage in the children’s healthcare debate, Democrats responded to Bush’s address by having Graeme Frost, a 12-year-old boy from Baltimore, deliver their weekly radio response. Frost recalled how the Children’s Health Insurance Program helped his family pay for his and his sister’s surgeries and recovery after they were in a car accident that left him in a coma and unable to eat or stand up. “I don’t know why President Bush wants to stop kids who really need help from getting [SCHIP],” Frost said in the address. “All I know is I have some really good doctors. They took great care of me when I was sick, and I’m glad I could see them because of the Children’s Health Program.” |
