Shootout at the White House Corral: Health Care Showdown Imminent

After a Senate committee voted last week to expand the State Children's Health Insurance Program, which assists six million children whose families who don't qualify for Medicaid but can't afford private insurance, President Bush promised to veto the bill.

Though around nine million kids still need health insurance, Bush portrayed the proposed expansion -- which would be funded by a 61-cent tax on cigarette packs -- as a trick that would let middle-class families ditch private insurers in favor of government care, ushering in a dangerous age of universal care.

Well, if Bush didn't like that plan -- which passed 17 to 4 in an unusual display of bipartisan agreement -- he'll be positively apoplectic over the House's plan to link SCHIP reform with a full-blown
Medicare overhaul.

By packaging Medicare with the children’s health program, Democrats say, they have built a strong intergenerational coalition that could help them overcome a presidential veto. The House bill has already drawn support from two powerful groups, AARP and the American Medical
Association, in part because it would prevent cuts in Medicare payments to doctors. But the House bill is likely to meet fierce resistance from some Republicans because it is more costly than the Senate bill and could undermine private Medicare health plans, which have been championed by Republicans for a decade. [...]

Lawmakers say they see an urgent need for action. The Children’s Health
Insurance Program is set to expire on Sept. 30, and Medicare payments to doctors will be cut by 10 percent on Jan. 1 if Congress does not act.

In a broad sense, Bush is right: there's a health care showdown coming.
But with his approval ratings scraping bottom and the public -- liberal and conservative alike -- united in outrage over US healthcare, he might be out of bullets.

Democrats Press House to Expand Health Care Bill [New York Times]