[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 20]
[House]
[Page 28249]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]


                 THE COST OF SCHIP AND THE COST OF WAR

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Florida (Mr. Hastings) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I customarily do not find 
myself on the floor after the close of business, but I am here today 
because I genuinely find myself in the position of concern that I 
believe a significant number of Americans share.
  We have passed, out of the House of Representatives and the U.S. 
Senate, a measure that will provide health care to many of this 
Nation's children who presently are uninsured. The President, 
exercising his prerogative, vetoed that measure, and as a result of 
that, further discussions are ongoing, and the need, again, is to put 
forward a measure that will provide health care for 10 million children 
in this country that find themselves and their families without the 
necessary assistance for medical care.
  Mr. Speaker, the President, on the day before yesterday, proposed 
that there be an additional $49 billion spent in Iraq and Afghanistan.
  There's no one in the House of Representatives who does not support 
the military efforts of the United States military. There's no one in 
the House of Representatives who is not exceedingly proud of the 
extraordinary work that the military has done. The military has done 
what the Commander-in-Chief required of them, and for those of us, as 
policymakers, expect that they would be able to do.
  And quite frankly, one of my colleagues is preparing legislation that 
talks about the benchmarks that we had originally set for the military 
and the fact that the military, the U.S. military and the coalition 
forces have achieved all of those benchmarks. And, in short, we could 
not arguably say, with the removal of Saddam Hussein or with other 
temporizing measures that have been brought to various provinces in 
Iraq, that the military has not been successful. They have been. And 
when they come home we want them to receive the proud accolades of the 
American citizenry, and that's every Member of the United States House 
of Representatives.
  But let's compare the cost in that particular effort with the cost 
for our children's health. Forty-one days in Iraq would provide health 
insurance for 10 million children.
  Now, I don't know all of the nuances of the defense budget, but I 
have reason to believe that if we did not give all of the money as 
requested by the President that this particular effort could be run for 
a substantial period of time.
  I might add, all of us are mindful of how stretched the United States 
military is. But you know something? Without knowing, I would venture a 
guess that some soldier's child may not be properly insured in this 
country. Some soldier's child. To my way of thinking, that is absurd. 
For us to be in the position, a Nation as resourceful as our Nation, a 
Nation as accomplished as our Nation, a Nation with genuinely the best 
physicians and nurses and hospitals in the world would find ourselves 
in this position.
  We must pass SCHIP, and we must do so immediately.

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