Judd Gregg: “we are today going to vote on what is euphemistically known as the SCHIP bill. It is clearly incorrectly identified…”

“we are today going to vote on what is euphemistically known as the SCHIP bill. It is clearly incorrectly identified because under that reading one would think it was for children, but it is actually a bill that also covers adults. I think there is a general consensus and no disagreement about the fact that children who are at or near poverty--even considerably above poverty-- families who have that type of fiscal constraint should be covered. There is agreement on that. The issue is whether we should take a program which covers children in poverty, or near poverty, up to 200 percent of the poverty level-- which, if we define poverty, it is twice as much as what poverty is-- whether we should cover children who are in families who have incomes well above 200 percent of the poverty level and adults who have no children at all, and whether we should do that extra coverage through a nationalized system. That is what is at issue.”