Have you been following the fight to reauthorize and expand the State-Child Health Insurance Program (S-CHIP)? Tuesday, a large majority of Congress members voted for a House-Senate compromise which will make lower cost health insurance available to millions of children who are, at present, without any. UPDATE: Thursday night, the Senate voted for S-CHIP 67-29; greater than two-thirds majority. Every GOP Senator in a tight bid for reelection in 2008 voted for S-CHIP and against Mr. Bush. President Bush, that deplorable politician, has promised a veto.

The problem progressives face is that, even with 45 GOP votes, we are 24 votes away from a veto over-riding two-thirds majority. Peter King and Vito Fossella, perhaps with a wish to avoid political extinction, voted for the bill (They’d voted against earlier versions in the House). Two NYS GOP Congress Members voted with Mr. Bush against Child Health: John "Randy" Kuhl & Thomas Renyolds. A Century Foundation poll shows voters want to spend more to insure more children and oppose a Bush veto.

Moveon.org-Politcal Action* is preparing to fight back, if Mr. Bush vetos. I’ve agreed to help put on a Manhattan Rapid Response Rally at 6PM the day after the Bush veto. We’ve decided to rally at the West Side of Columbus Circle in front of the Time-Warner building. We are still begging for permits. More than 150 others are planned. Please click here to sign-up and help. More suggested action and background post-jump.

I attended last night’s Moveon rally against President Bush Veto in union square along with perhaps 500 others. If you want to see what it looked like check out Beth Zucker’s photos here . I’m in a few of them. It was, I thought, for the gravity of the situation, a sparsely attended and unfocused event; some of which is my fault: I should have done more to make it better attended; some of it is your fault.

The House had, hours before, been unable to overcome the President’s veto and rumors abound that Congressional Democrats are searching for a way to cave into our nutty decider-in-chief. The Washington Post, for example, leads Thursday with this under the headline “Congressional Democrats Back Down on Iraq Timetable.”