Editorial: Children left stranded

Sunday, Sept. 30, 2007 | 6:57 a.m.

Last week Congress approved a bill to renew and expand the State Children's Health Insurance Program, a federal-state program that provides health insurance coverage for 6.6 million children in low-income working families that earn too much to qualify for Medicaid assistance but earn too little to afford private health insurance.

The vote in the Senate to expand the program was impressive - 67-29 - as it was in the House - 265-159 - but it didn't muster a two-thirds majority in both houses of Congress that would be necessary to override President Bush's promised veto.

This is one of those cases in which every single congressional vote truly mattered. And when it came down to making that final decision, at least two members of Nevada's congressional delegation - Republicans Sen. John Ensign and Rep. Dean Heller - failed Nevada's children by voting against this crucial program. Republican Rep. John Porter had originally opposed legislation to renew and expand the program, but changed his mind and voted in favor of it when the House approved the bill on Tuesday. Yes, that's right, Porter was against the expansion before he was for it. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Rep. Shelley Berkley, both Democrats, voted for the expansion.

However, Bush and Republicans such as Ensign and Heller opposed the legislation because it called for expanding the program to cover roughly 4 million more children nationwide.

The State Children's Health Insurance Program, which currently has 38,000 Nevada children enrolled , was to expire today. But last week, with a Bush veto looming, Congress started working on alternative legislation to keep the current program going for at least the next couple of months.

In a story by the Las Vegas Sun on Tuesday, a spokesman for Ensign told Sun reporter Lisa Mascaro that the senator considers the legislation an effort to turn the program "into a new, unaffordable entitlement program for the upper-middle class."

Is he kidding? Nevada ranks among the worst in the nation when it comes to providing health coverage for its children because families cannot afford coverage, and this legislation would simply expand what has been a successful program.

It also is worth noting that during the debate on the floor of the Senate, as The New York Times reported, Ensign denounced the legislation as "a step toward the Democrats' ultimate goal of a single-payer, government-run health care system."

We couldn't have put it better than conservative Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, who responded to Ensign's contention: "That's a nice, sweet, cute little argument, but it does not solve the problem of how you help these kids. I am not about to allow these children to go without health care."

Expanding the children's health program really shouldn't have been a partisan issue, and it wasn't for many conservative Republicans who joined with Democrats in voting for this legislation. But now, because of such failed and uncaring leadership as that exhibited by Ensign and Heller, who are bound and determined to stand by Bush, thousands of Nevada's children who now lack access to adequate health care won't be eligible to receive such coverage.