Give 'em credit for trying, and certainly there will be many that buy into the 'but the children' mentality, but the economy won out on this one for now as President Bush's veto of the SCHIP expansion was upheld by the U.S. House of Representatives despite pleas by the liberal side.

The Democrats may have an election issue with this one, but then again, as many others have said and I've also said in the past, the memory of the voters in this country is pretty darned short.  Even as congress critters go out and campaign on this issue and others, the voters that actually do show up at the polls tend to vote only on what matters to them, and not so much on issues that the politicians tell them they should be concerned about.

I'm neither happy nor sad that the SCHIP expansion veto stands, but I am happy that the political system worked here and that will of the majority wasn't necessarily shoved down the throats of the minority.  SCHIP could be expanded if *both* sides sat down and negotiated on the right and proper way to do it and pay for it.  Unfortunately neither side really wanted to negotiate, though I place quite a bit of blame back over on the Democrats and liberals as they were cocksure that they were going to push through their version of things.  Not that the Democrats will actually negotiate in the future as they know that Bush is a lame duck with not much time left, but there is always hope.