The Swift Boating of Graham Frost (FR Mentioned; TV Networks Stalking Frosts)

Time Magazine ^ | Thursday, October 11, 2007 | Karen Tumulty

[kristinn]

Since then, Frost and his family have been introduced first-hand to something else that most kids his age haven't: the reality of how brutal partisan politics can be in the Internet age. It started over the weekend, when a blogger calling himself Icwhatudo put up a post on the conservative website Freerepublic.com noting what he had found by scavenging around the internet: that Graeme attends a private school, lives in a remodeled house near one that had sold for $485,000 in March and is the child of parents whose wedding was announced in the New York Times. The post also noted that his father purchased a $160,000 commercial space in 1999.

SNIP

And while they are still uninsured, they claim it is most certainly not by choice. Bonnie Frost says the last time she priced health coverage, she learned it would cost them $1,200 a month.

In short, just as the radio spot claimed, the Frosts are precisely the kind of people that the SCHIP program was intended to help.

SNIP

While the family continues to support the vetoed bill that would expand the program to 4 million more children, they are hoping to remove themselves from the middle of the storm. After giving a few interviews, Halsey and Bonnie Frost now say they don't want to say anything more, though network camera crews have planted themselves in front of their house.

SNIP

Politics has never been a gentle game. As far back as 1895, satirist Finley Peter Dunne's fictional saloonkeeper Martin Dooley observed that women, children and prohibitionists would do well to stay out of it, because "politics ain't beanbag." But surely, even Mr. Dooley could never have imagined a day would come when a mere seventh grader could be swift-boated.

[Albion Wilde]

... from the Dead Zone,1983. Martin Sheen is the creepy presidential candidate who uses the child as a shield when he's being shot at. It's meant to show what Hillary and the dems do when they hide behind the kids.

LOL! Thanks for the explanation — it fits!

[GovernmentShrinker]

I think they WILL be phoning the school, and talking amongst themselves in small groups. The parents who have more limited financial resources than the Frosts had, and who have been paying a whopping lot more tuition out of their pockets will be calling, as well as some of the wealthiest parents, who are often significant donors to the financial aid programs in addition to paying full sticker price for their own kids, and have probably been under the impression that the funds were used for truly needy families.

What I don’t think will happen - both out of sympathy for the Frost children who’ve been through a heck of a lot, and out of concern that college admissions string-pulling on their children’s behalf might be withheld in retaliation — is parents expressing their displeasure openly to the media or in organized meeting of school officials and parents. I wouldn’t be surprised, however, if one or more of them engineered some info leaks to the media.

[2CAVTrooper]

“I guess you can put a price on your kids health. Just what kind of policy cost $1200 a month? What did they do, go to “Mike’s Insurance” and get a quote?”

Yeah no shit, I have full coverage and pay $310 every other month.

[benjamin032]

And what Lobby put the pressure on to get these laws passed?

[cgbg]

Why doesn't she and her hubby demand a 1,200 per month reduction in taxes? Why doesn't she ask herself why she thinks other people- for example, single people and childless couples- should be forced to pay for her children's health care, and every pediatrician be for all practical purposes turned into just another government employee? If she and hubby can't support kids why did she have them? Why is her decision everybody else's fault and responsibility? Why doesn't she sacrifice some of her wealth and comfort to get this coverage if she thinks it so critical that it is worth using government to steal from other people?

Actually, Michelle Malkin was contacted by one of the neighbors who explained the answer to your question.

The Frosts are one of those dingy liberal couples who want to run everyone else's lives but can't seem to get out of their own way when facing day to day circumstance in their own lives.

In my home state (CT) the dingy liberals are a dime a dozen. You have to drive defensively if you see them pull out of the driveway and pretend you are deaf if they try to talk politics in your presence. There is one down the street that has their kids drawing peace signs on the street. Fortunately it rains a lot around here so we don't have to look at the obscenity for very long.

:-)

[RedStateRocker]

Various lobbies; the insurance industry amongst them. Of course like any industry they are going to try to use governmental action for advantage. So do car makers, lawyers, hospitals; the problem is that government has the power to make such laws in the first place, IMHO.
Let the market decide, after all it turns out that (many) people will spend *more* for an airbag, for example, not to argue the efficacy of any such things, merely the principle that once government can regulate something that pressure groups will arise to manipulate government regulation of that something.