Say what you like about House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, but this is a carefully-designed stiletto.

While the House ties up some legislative loose ends this week before adjourning for the year, there is one suspension bill the public — and House Republicans — might be surprised to find many Democrats opposing: a measure aimed at boosting pediatric medical research at the National Institutes of Health.

The “Gabriella Miller Kids First Research Act,” named after a 10-year-old girl who died in October following an 11-month battle with an inoperable brain tumor, would end $12.5 million in funding for party nominating conventions and authorize the money for pediatric research grants instead. It’s the latest iteration of a proposal House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., unveiled in April and is sponsored by Rep. Gregg Harper, R-Miss.

Especially this bit, which is absolutely stunning in its lack of historical awareness.

“They’re politicizing the death of a child by naming the bill after her,” a Democratic leadership aide told CQ Roll Call on Tuesday. “That’s pretty disingenuous and callous to use a tragedy like hers to advance something partisan.”

Yeah. What a mean tactic, huh? Come, I will conceal nothing from you: twelve and a half million bucks, in the context of our federal budget, is barely a blip on the radar. It’s barely a blip of a blip. But if they’re going to react this badly to losing that money for their convention*? …Heck, I want to use the promise of this money to sadistically tease the Democratic party leadership. I’m pretty that, with the right leadup, we can have them chase down the beckoning red laser dot of funding right down the hall – and into a wall**…

Via Instapundit.

Moe Lane (crosspost)

*And let me be serious for a moment: neither the Democratic nor the Republican party need to have their party nominating conventions be funded by the federal government – which is to say, me. I’d rather the money went to pediatric research myself.

**I don’t try to run actual cats into walls, mind you. I’m not evil.