Texas Blue Mailbag: Week of September 30

In the wake of a week that saw the vetoing of SCHIP and the reporting of campaign fundraising totals for the quarter, this week's Mailbag is low on the yuks and high on the political discussion.

Jay and Sarah ask:

1. Do you think it was coincidence that Bush vetoed the State Children's Health Insurance Program the same morning he went to Pennsylvania regarding the budget.

"Bush exercised the veto at 10 a.m. ET before leaving the White House for a trip to Lancaster, Pennsylvania, to discuss the federal budget and taxes." —CNN.COM

Josh replies:
Not coincidental at all — politicians will often coordinate something they are doing that might be unpopular with something functional or necessary to try and bleed the edges until the bad thing they've done seems necessary. In this case it hasn't worked out so well for Bush, as his decision to block kids from getting health care has been universally reviled, as it should be. I made the joke earlier this week that it seems like he's got a big bag on his desk labelled "THINGS YOU SHOULDN'T VETO" and he, from time to time, just pulls one out.

He got to mention it in his speech, but you'll notice the veto-ing took place in relative solitude and the event where he talked about it had a lot of other actual business in the content, unlike his first veto. For those of you that don't like clicking on links, here's what the presser after that veto looked like, from the New York Times:

This wasn't something else he rolled the stem cell veto into, this was a moment engineered specifically for him to celebrate that fact that he'd just taken up the flaming sword and protected, er, stem cells. Some of them, anyways.

Jay and Sarah also ask:

2. Relatively speaking, what is the cost of funding this bill compared to the cost of funding the war in the Middle East.

George answers:

Well, we all know that the cost of pretty much every spending item in the federal budget pales in comparison to the cost of the Iraq War. In the case of the SCHIP increase, its cost was estimated as just shy of $35 billion over the next five years. (When coupled with the tobacco tax increase that was supposed to go along with it, it actually would've resulted in a $1.4 billion surplus over the next five years.)

By comparison, the Iraq War costs us a bit over $200 million a day. That would be approximately $6 billion a month, or over $36 billion in six months. So what we spend on the Iraq War in a little over a month would pay for the SCHIP increase for a year.

And, may I add, the per diem cost of the Iraq War (I hate using that term -- we have no defined objective or win condition, we aren't moving against a political state, it's not a war) has been going up regularly since its start. The latest numbers I could find for per diem cost were from last year. If someone were to tell me that the cost is now at $250 million a day, I wouldn't be half surprised.

Pat asks:

I keep asking everyone--is there anyone who can provide a recommended position/vote on these 16 amendments that are on the 6 Nov ballot. I have what the League of Women Voters put out, but is there a "Democratic" position?? It seems to me that there should be.

Josh says:
At the end of July, staff writer John McLelland put together a rundown of each amendment, with some opining on each. These aren't the official Democratic positions or anything, but he does attempt to explain the ones that aren't totally locked up in legal language. He makes an excellent point, as well: if you want a Democratic agenda on the Constitutional amendments, HJR90 — or as you will see it on the ballot, Proposition 15 — is the one for you. It actually has some bipartisan support, and the Texans to Cure Cancer PAC is working on this whole "curing cancer" part.

Joey says:

how significant are the campaign funding stats that have been pushed by the media so heavily in the past few weeks?

George replies:

How significant? They're very significant. Very, very significant. But frankly, it's only because the media have been pushing them so heavily that they're significant at all.

Don't get me wrong -- there are important things you can tell from, for example, Ron Paul having raised as much as John McCain. But the difference between "front-runners" that raised $11, $10 and $9 million is much less significant than, say, the most recent poll numbers. And we all know how much those matter. (Hint: At this point? Not that much. Trends, sure, maybe. Polls, not so much.)