Sorry to disagree Ross but one of GW's first acts in office was to sign a EO, the New Freedom Initiative I believe. Buried within this program, underneath apparently laudable efforts, are elements calling for every pregnant mother to be monitored and tested by Uncle Sam's payed state representatives; this program continues on to call for that child(meaning every child), from birth to the age of 18, to be monitored, and tested, by the state mental health organizations, the front line being the schools and social workers(more state payroll/less accountability). Did I mention that the pharmaceutical companies are throwing money at the state's for the development of this expansive market? Think life long addicts, either willingly or as a societal mandate(your case worker said so).

Although I am sympathetic to children health care needs, as I was a child who suffered through both parental and state neglect, I cannot support this David. Think of the trillions spent on the war on poverty. I mention that because, next to none of that money was spent on simple preventative approaches like annual dental visits which has a tremendous effect upon ones short and long term health and well being. Far more good would be accomplished if you or I or each of us with the means, took a single kid under our wing. That would be humane, and personal for all concerned.

Finally -back to GW and the notion he is against this due to his fiscal conservatism- the President also supported the open ended give the old people drugs bill. Another pharmaceutical wet dream.

People, I said PEOPLE, would be much better off without all these drugs. If you were to study the past one hundred or so years of pharmaceutical history, and the health care industry generally, you would see there has been a concerted effort away from homeopathic treatments, no self medication allowed. If you would look into the future you would discover the coming evidence of the continuation of that trend: CODEX ALIMENTARIUS, which will criminalize the use of all sorts of common herbs(assuming they haven't been patented first). It seems, there's more profit for certain Stakeholders in refilling prescriptions than effect grow your own remedies.

And no, although self employed, we cannot afford health insurance but we manage nonetheless. ANd, the last thing we want to see is mandatory health insurance.

There's so much more, but way too many seem to believe it's the governments job to fix or prevent every little inconvenience, which of course creates this huge unresponsive middle man sucking off resources people could keep and better manage themselves. And of course there's always the truism that you could give every person in the world a million dollars and within two years, the poor would be just as poor as before. E.g., remember the Katrina FEMA debit cards! I favor people being allowed their ill conceived decisions over Uncle Governmental butting-in their bureaucracy, every time.

But then I understand that human liberty, the liberty of conscience variety, comes with human misery. And I'm good with that since it affords me too the opportunity to improve my situation. The welfare state is dedicated to keeping people dependent. If you think I exaggerate, you should head out into the projects and broken down neighborhoods and survey the folks as to how many are multigenerational, say third or even fourth generation welfarites. To a degree, I pity them, cause most don't know they're in a trap(but that too speaks to human nature).

Sorry for the lengthy stream of consciousness