I won’t be bullied on SCHIP.

This article was written by a Michigan Representative Tim Walberg in response to the pressure against him on the SCHIP program. Thank you to Michelle Malkin for pointing this to me at her blog. It is a defense of his position through the turmoil of the radio ads playing a song about 'having friends in low places'. Enjoy the article.

For the Children
I won’t be bullied on SCHIP.

By Tim Walberg

Right now if you listen to a popular country radio station in south-central Michigan, you can hear advertisements spreading lies about my position on S-CHIP (State Children’s Health Insurance Program).

The station selection for this ad seems appropriate for House Democrats, whose blatant twisting of the truth is fit for a remake of Garth Brooks’s classic song “Friends in Low Places.”

House Democrats continue to mischaracterize Republican support of the S-CHIP program, and would like you to believe that Republicans do not care about poor, needy kids.

Democrats are using this smear campaign against Republicans to gain support for their tax-and-spend economic policies. Sadly, they are taking the focus away from where this debate should be: meeting the needs of children of low-income families.

I support renewing S-CHIP to provide health care to children in low-income families, but I also believe we need to ensure that the children’s health program is available for children who need it, and not for adults, people who enter the country illegally, or families who already have private insurance.

The Democratic legislation takes a program originally meant for children of low-income families and expands it to cover some families earning up to $83,000 and illegal immigrants, while moving millions of children from private health insurance to government programs.

In 2006, 118,501 children and 101,919 adults in Michigan received health care from the S-CHIP program. Incredibly, this means that 46 percent of Michigan’s funding allotment intended to give poor children health insurance actually went to cover adults.

continue reading the article here.