Each August, Congress takes a month long recess. Most years, congressmen take this opportunity to go on vacation or simply hang out back at home. This year, President Obama has asked Congress to take the health care issue to the people. Many congressmen are finding out how people feel about the problem in the form of town hall events.
Many of these town halls, which have been held already in Florida, New York, Georgia, Texas, Wisconsin, and Ohio, are being disrupted by angry protestors.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEH9M0Wgvzc&NR=1&feature=fvwp
Don’t get me wrong, I’m all about a good old fashioned protest when it has the potential to be productive. However, these protests appear to be designed to not let supporters of the health care bill have a voice or just to scare the crap out of their elected officials.
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/breaking-news/story/1172648.html
http://news.yahoo.com/s/bloomberg/20090805/pl_bloomberg/a8lefaompeb0_1
We’ve actually resorted to hanging effigies of our Representatives? Wow.
The saddest part of this issue, for me, is that the whole point of a town hall meeting is to hear all sides of the story. If you disagree with how your representative is voting, then go, present your argument, and we can have an honest debate about the issue. Yelling and screaming over someone who actually has something to say or an important question is rude, childish, and, as far as I can tell, is disrupting someone’s right to freedom of speech. (Read the constitution recently? I’m pretty sure the First Amendment is still in effect.)
One representative, Rep. Tim Bishop (D-NY), has even suspended town hall meetings after residents called the Suffolk County Police to escort him back to his car through a large crowd of rowdy protestors.
The group that appears to be behind many of the disruptions is known as the Tea Party Patriots. If you happen to be all about interrupting town hall meetings and want more information here’s the website: http://teapartypatriots.org/HC.aspx
On a completely different note, if you’ve heard that by signing up for the Cash for Clunkers program the federal government will be granted access to your computer and files, it is absolutely not true.
But just for grins, here’s a link to the original story (which does sound pretty terrifying when you first watch it): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWs12ccbOiE
Here’s a link to the myth debunking website Snopes: http://www.snopes.com/computer/internet/clunkers.asp
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I think a lot of those protests that are going on at town hall meetings, in regards to health care, are being funded by a PR lobby firm for the insurance industry (BIG surprise). People are actually being paid to show up and disrupt those events.
ReplyDeleteAlso, when I was watching the news film footage of those disruptions, many of those people looked old enough to be on Medicare.
Which brings me to the man who said at one of those meetings, something to the effects of "keep your government hands off my Medicare". Ah, excuse me, but Medicare IS a government program.
Kinda scary the country we are living in today.
I have another angle on these people who are making all the noise at these town hall meetings.
ReplyDeleteI think the "angry" people at these protests are actually insurance company employees.
Think about all the people that will be out of work if the insurance companies go out of business due to some sort of public option health care coverage. Probably tens to hundreds of thousands.
I'm sure it doesn't take too much incentive to get these people to show up. Plant the idea they might lose their jobs, give them time off from their jobs to attend these meetings (maybe even pay the employees overtime for participating) and hand them the play book and talking points (or shouting points, in this case) on the way out.
Voila, you've got yourself a "movement".
Although it would be too bad if everyone at the insurance companies lost their jobs (which I seriously doubt for so many reasons that I'm not even going to go there), I think they are just going about it the wrong way. Job losses is a serious argument against a public option if it really is going to be that much better than the private sector, so stand up at a town hall meeting and present that argument. Don't yell over your fellow citizens who have legitimate arguments of their own.
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