working on a very important bill but i do want to take a moment to respond to a press conference that the president just held where he spoke about his intent to veto the bipartisan children's health care bill that we will be sending to him it's very important that we indicate that just because the president has a bully public does not mean he is accurate or right and it doesn't matter how much spin they want to put on the situation the reality is that the president united states gave us a budget earlier this year and as a member of the budget committee but we looked at this very carefully this president proposed a budget that would cut according to c b s one point six million children would cut their health care current children so when i hear the president at a press conference talking about the fact that he wants to make sure children are covered with health insurance actions speak louder than words mr president the president asked us to put forward a budget that would cut one point six million children of working families who currently have health insurance off from their health care we rejected that we looked at the fact that there are from six to seven million children who currently qualify to receive children's health insurance and again we're working families folks that don't qualify for low income help mom or dad or both are working one two maybe three minimum wage jobs who are desperately concerned that at least their children have the health care they need i am very proud that we came together as a united states senate and in a true bipartisan effort developed a health care program antron that will now i make sure every child who currently has health insurance but that four million more children will be able to have health care in this country their moms and dads won't have to go to bed at night and praying that please don't let the kids get sick sixty eight members sixty eight members of the senate not counting the fact that senator johnson who is now back with us would make that sixty nine members voted together and true bipartisanship to say one of the basic values of this country is to make sure the children of this country of working families have the opportunity to get the health care that they need pretty basic mr president this is a matter of values and priorities later today just in a few moments i'm going to be joining with families usa to announce their new study that says that says that ninety million americans ninety million americans sometime in the last two years didn't have health insurance one out of three americans sometime in the last two years did not have health insurance this is a national tragedy and for us not to at least focus on children at least say that our value as americans is to make sure that children of low income working families get basic health care they need to me is something that i find incredibly important and appalling quite frankly that the president i say it's says on the one hand that he will veto a bipartisan bill to expand health care coverage to children of working families and then we'll have the i hate to say what i was going to say the the the  american people want to see changed i would be happy to i'd like to ask the senator i first thank the senator from michigan for making his statement on the floor when i listen to the news reports this morning some from the white house said that they did not believe we should be helping to pay for health insurance to families that were well off such as families that are making sixty thousand dollars a year that was the reference that was made and i would like to ask the senator from michigan facing health insurance premiums assuming that the whole family is healthy could in some circumstances cost a family thousands of dollars each year if your gross income is sixty thousand then you're trying to get by with three or four thousand dollars a month an eight hundred dollar health insurance bill for a healthy family let alone twelve hundred or more for a family with a sick child it's hard for me to understand how the white house could say that a family making sixty thousand dollars a year is so well off that they wouldn't need help in providing health insurance to their children and i asked the senator from michigan the president's position here really seems to me to be inconsistent providing tax cuts for the wealthiest people in america and then saying folks that make sixty thousand dollars a year are well off and don't need a helping hand when it comes to their children's health insurance so in addition to the cost of the war in iraq i asked a senator of michigan isn't it a little difficult to understand the president's position of giving tax breaks to the wealthy and not giving working families making sixty thousand dollars a year a helping hand with their health insurance for kids well my distinguished colleague it's absolutely correct and i thank you for your comment mr president this is truly a question of values and cry or these that's what we're about in this business and this chamber when we make decisions the president i states has said the wealthiest among us are much more important than moms and dads most of whom by the way are making much less than what we're talking a numbers at the white house is put out but that those families not to be able to minimum know that their children have health insurance when they get set but what adds insult to injury i believe for the american people is to know that on top of that on top of tax priorities for the wealthy versus families and their health care is the fact that on the one hand what we've put together is something that is responsible bipartisan fully paid for within the budget and the president is going to be sending us a request anywhere from one hundred fifty to two hundred billion dollars more for a war in iraq that the american people want to change a positive is not supported by the majority of americans and to add insult to injury none of it is paid for it will go directly on to the national debt so this is a question of values and priorities and it doesn't matter again as i said when i began how much the president wants to spend it we all know he has a very big megaphone here very big pulpit doesn't mean he's right the spend machine cannot cannot outweigh what is going on here in terms of american families we have something here that we have done together on a bipartisan basis we should all be very proud of it a basic for every single one of our families has the ability to know that we can care for our children and that they'll have the health care that they need for too many families today too many for families that don't get help because they don't have a low enough income they're working they're putting it together maybe it's a single mom maybe it's a single dad maybe it's mom and dad or they're putting together the income in a way where they can pay all the increased costs that everybody is having to deal with the gas prices that are are going up going and the possibility of losing jobs certainly in my state wages going down health care costs going up all of the things that are squeezing our working families and we're saying you know what one of the things that we can do together and we've already done it here we're going to be sending to the president is and that the ability for four million more children to get the health care that they need moms and dads working not making enough to be able to pay for health insurance we as a country ought to be able to say we at least want the children the children to be able to receive the health insurance that they need health care in my opinion mr president should be a right for the greatest country in the world not a privilege too many things have been given to the privileged in this country while working families are trying hard every day to make ends meet so i encourage and i want to thank all of our colleagues that have worked so hard on this legislation it's something that we can all be very proud of and i would ask the president to take another look at this body together sixty eight members that voted were not playing politics we were coming together in a bipartisan way to be able to give more children american children the ability to get their health care needs taken care of and it's time that we have the president join with us in the right set of priorities for american families thank certainly leads that we have a deadly war underway one hundred american soldiers have been killed on average every single month almost four thousand have died thirty thousand have been injured at least ten thousand seriously injured with amputations and burns and traumatic brain injury that should be the focal point of what we do here on the floor of the senate and it is yesterday sadly an important minute by senator virginia and important amendment for soldiers and their families was defeated defeated on a vote of fifty six to forty four which the average person would say it sounds like you won not by senate math by senate math it takes sixty votes on many controversy lay shoes in this one required sixty so fifty six votes weren't enough and we were defeated in an effort to say something very straightforward if you're going to ask our soldiers to be deployed in combat risking their lives for twelve months you should at least give them twelve months afterwards to rest be reunited with their family retrained and reequipped before they go back into comics so twelve months on duty twelve months off duty it was  d and if you've met with these soldiers and their families if you know the stress that they're under if you read the numbers about the divorce rate among our soldiers the suicide rate the post traumatic stress disorder which they are battling as they return from the stress of battle it's hard to imagine that the senate would not give that kind of consideration to our soldiers and their families that's a critically important debate but now we will soon move to another very important debate it's about health insurance everybody in america and knows that there's something that needs to be done on health insurance forty seven million of our neighbors in america people who live with us in communities and go to church with us have no health insurance at all in my home state of illinois i went back in august in deep southern illinois near harrisburg and sailing county and a woman came to me and said i'm sixty three years old i'm a realtor i've never had health insurance one day in my life hard to imagine but that's the reality that many americans working americans face every single day they are one diagnosis one illness away from bankruptcy those are the people with no health let's speak about those who have health insurance but it isn't good enough it costs more each year and covers less we know the story businesses tell you labor unions tell you families tell you i don't have the kind of coverage i want and it costs a fortune that's the reality and we also know that in our great nation there are fifteen million children of the forty seven i mentioned earlier fifteen million children with no health insurance these are kids from families not poor enough to qualify for medicaid and not fortunate enough to have a parent with a job that has health insurance fifteen million kids for whom the only opportunity for health care is a trip to an emergency room well we wanted to change that five years ago and passed this chip program children's health insurance program and said let's do something about it and so we covered six million of the fifteen million kids and now the program is going to expire in just a few days our hope was with this new congress that we could expand health insurance to cover more children at least three million more we want to make sure that all fifteen million are covered but we're not going to quite reach that goal we wanted at least get closer with nine million covered with a bipartisan agreement to do that the senate came together cooperate compromise and reached an agreement to expand health insurance protection to another three million kids this morning the present united states had a press availability and announced that he would oppose this bill expanding health insurance for children at the time a spokesman for his administration said we don't want to give health insurance to families that are well off they defined a family that's well off as one that makes sixty thousand dollars a year now i have to tell you that sixty thousand dollars is more than the average wage in my hometown of springfield illinois but not by much sixty thousand dollars a year after you pay your taxes doesn't leave a lot of money for your mortgage payment for your utility bills for your property taxes for the kids school expenses and if you happen to not have health insurance where you work sixty thousand dollars doesn't give you a cushion to turn around and buy health insurance that insurance is going to cost you six hundred eight hundred dollars a month maybe a thousand maybe more we think those families with kids who don't have health insurance who are making sixty thousand dollars deserve a helping hand so that they can have at least the security of health insurance to know that their kids are covered it's going to be a battle we're going to pass this bill and so that the president is going to veto this bill at least he promises to i hope you reconsider that and then we get a chance to override his veto this is the kind of debate which really matters for millions of americans and their families this debate gets down to one of the real issues that keep parents awake at night worrying about their kids some of us in our lives have been through this experience i was a law student with a my wife and i had a little baby and i had no health insurance we had some medical issues with our baby and i didn't have health insurance to turn to that happened many years ago my daughter's now forty years old but let me tell you i'll never forget it there was a sinking feeling that my girl was not going to get the best doctor in best care because as a father i didn't have health insurance cover it was only a short period of my life but i'll never forget it i can imagine people that live with that feeling every day every week every month and every year should we as a great and giving nation care about our own first this president will not even blink when he sends us a bill in a week or so asking for a hundred and ninety eight billion more dollars for the war in iraq a hundred and ninety eight billion and yet he's unwilling to spend six billion dollars for health insurance for children that's about what it is each year over a five year period of time one hundred ninety eight billion for the war in iraq but not sick