Well, it’s official. President Bush hates children.

Since his fourth veto struck down a bill for a “popular” health care plan that would provide federal health insurance to underprivileged children, an uproarious backlash has occurred on account of his decision. But in all honesty, can you think of any other explanation for this – as Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid puts it – “heartless” veto?

I mean, it couldn’t possibly be because the bill would be able to assist families whose income is on average $60,000 (about three times the federal poverty level) per year and as high as $83,000 per year, or because the plan would drop its funding by 80 percent in its sixth year, forcing millions of children to lose their health insurance, or the idea of federal health insurance.

No, it’s because George Bush hates children. And no one knows this more, or better, than the Democratic Congress.

If you couldn’t tell by now, the president is a very stubborn man. It’s a trait that is hated by many, yet one that I admire the most about him (God forbid a leader actually, you know, leads). But since the American public suffers largely from an undiagnosed case of ADD, Congress has felt that it is its job to remind us all of how obdurate and heartless the president really is. First, they put together a bill calling for troop withdrawal, knowing full well that a presidential veto was soon to follow, and now there is the issue of this health care bill.

So why would they spend the unnecessary taxpayer dollars to write a bill if they knew it wouldn’t pass?

The answer is simple. It’s all politics. Congressional Democrats are using Bush’s stubbornness to their advantage, making him look like a jerk who wants all poor children to die. They make him choose between a health care bill that won’t work or making himself out to be the most heartless “Ebenezer Scrooge,” as Rep. Jim Cooper of Tennessee put it on the House floor, implying that the president was “against Tiny Tim.”

The president has been put into a bind by politicians who act like they give a crap about poor children’s welfare. That way they can sit back, deem his veto “ideological,” call the president some names, let the media have a field day and watch the votes pour in next November. It’s a political game that has put poor families in the forefront as an exploited demographic. This is something Democrats like to do constantly whenever they put on the mask of “compassion” and “morality,” lest they let their true intentions of eroding private industry come to the surface.

One thing that is lost in the frenzy taking place is the fact that the president had suggested an alternative plan – one that doesn’t require people to stand in DMV-like lines to receive health insurance. This plan would offer assistance to those who can’t afford private health insurance rather than just provide socialized medicine to U.S. citizens to compete with the industry. In Lancaster, Pa., soon after the veto, the president told a crowd of private business owners “the policies of the government ought to be to help poor children and to focus on poor children, and the policies of the government ought to be to help people find private insurance, not federal coverage. And that’s where the philosophical divide comes in.”

The president’s veto comes to the dismay of almost everyone who lets their emotions and their morals rule their decision-making process, but health care is not about morals. It is about enacting a plan that will actually work. This one would not work as a health care plan, and it was never meant to be.

However, it has already succeeded as its true intention of becoming another weapon in the Democrats arsenal to use come next year, when they can continue to exploit the health of children – among other things – for their own political gain.

– Andrew Gionnette is a senior in mechanical engineering from Chanhassen, Minn.