One of the more vicious and defamatory lies being spread about our commander in chief is that he asks nothing -- no pain, no hardship, no sacrifice -- from the American people in the prosecution of his assorted wars: in Iraq, in Afghanistan, in the global one against all who detest our freedoms. It is this sort of audacious dishonesty that turns the good people of this great Republic off politics, and makes them want to slither back to resigned disgust and political indifference.
It is also the sort of lie that is easily dispelled and dispatched, if only we vulnerable consumers of gross misrepresentations would inform ourselves. Thus it was that I sat yesterday morning reading the New York Times -- the paper of record, mind you -- absorbing with intense interest a story that put the aforementioned lie to the rack.
"The White House said on Saturday that President Bush would veto a bipartisan plan to expand the Childrenβs Health Insurance Program, drafted over the last six months by senior members of the Senate Finance Committee."
Why? Because it's too costly. Children's health care is a societal frill that kids should learn to do without. For heaven's sake, haven't these greedy, grabby urchins heard there's a war on?
But as these hypochondriacal youngsters busy the halls of Congress with their Brooks Brothers lobbyists and flood the White House with slickly orchestrated special-interest appeals, our commander in chief is standing firm. Unlike the greedy and grabby, he understands that sensible sacrifices need to be made.
"The proposal would increase current levels of spending by $35 billion over the next five years, bringing the total to $60 billion ... [and] would reduce the number of uninsured children by 4.1 million."
Well, that's fine and dandy; but it's also an annual outlay of $12 billion -- an entire month's worth of fighting them over there so we don't have to fight them here.
Did the little buggers so full of fiscal demands pause over that? Did they once give any thought to how pointless their oh-so-precious doctor visits would be when whole armies of scimitar-clenching Islamofascists run rampant throughout America, because we had to starve the already fiscally strapped DoD just to coddle them?
Did they once stop to think that by 2017 the global war on terror -- with the mother lode being fought in Iraq -- will cost as much as $1.4 trillion? Did they? Huh? Did they give any thought to pitching in? To making their sacrifice?
Of course not. It's just gimme gimme gimme with adolescents, even as desperate hedge fund moguls must fight in despair to see that their unearned booty is taxed fairly and equitably, meaning not at all.
But the Commander Guy gave it some thought. Because he knows sacrifice is the sine qua non of a safe, fortified and robust America.
And his spokesman, Tony Fratto, made a good point in addition to rejecting prepubescent selfishness at the expense of the public treasury: He noted the "plan does not include any of Mr. Bushβs proposals to change the tax treatment of health insurance, in an effort to make it more affordable for millions of Americans."
There, you see? Millions of children in the urban ghettos and rural shanties of this vast land could have simply advised their tax attorneys to keep an eye out for beneficial changes in health-insurance tax credits. Yet they skirt even this modest effort.
The president won't have it. He knows sacrifice must begin with someone, and it might as well be sniffling, asthmatic toddlers.