Petulant president pisses on poor children

What a load of horseshit:

President Bush yesterday rejected entreaties by his Republican allies that he compromise with Democrats on legislation to renew a popular program that provides health coverage to poor children, saying that expanding the program would enlarge the role of the federal government at the expense of private insurance.

The president said he objects on philosophical grounds to a bipartisan Senate proposal to boost the State Children's Health Insurance Program by $35 billion over five years. Bush has proposed $5 billion in increased funding and has threatened to veto the Senate compromise and a more costly expansion being contemplated in the House.

"Objects on philosophical grounds," my ass. Bush will expand public spending when it serves to enrich his cronies or allows him to play toy soldier in the Situation Room, but expend some scratch to provide poor kids with some health care? He's got to pretend to have principles.

The sociologist in me always wants to warn that there are structural tendencies which compel political leaders to act in certain ways, but the folks in the Bush administration are downright evil.