Where have we witnessed this scene before: throngs of angry, belligerent conservative goons disrupting public debate of a heated issue? And where have we seen this tactic before: Republicans trying to frame issues with malicious lies about the opposition and its policies?
That's exactly what's happening as President Barack Obama attempts to reform the health care industry to create universal coverage, and as Democratic members of Congress hold "town hall" meetings across the country to explain the program. Hordes of semi-violent demagogues have hijacked these events, shouting down the speakers and even hanging the legislators in effigy. It's shocking and reprehensible.
There's been much controversy surrounding these highly contentious gatherings over the belief that the mobs have been prepped and mobilized by the GOP and/or special interest groups backed by the drug, hospital and insurance industries. While the likelihood is that most are (radio host Sean Hannity's Web site entices people to "Become a part of the mob! Attend an Obama Care Townhall near you!" and then lists dozens of scheduled meetings), that's not the real issue here.
It's not our business whether the crowds are organized by self-serving, anti-Obama conservative groups. I don't care whether Karl Rove himself packs these people on a bus, provides them scripts, hands them lunch, and personally leads them into the meeting areas. The First Amendment protects free speech, and these people have a right to organize, assemble and speak their minds however they see fit, as long as they do so in a non-disruptive, non-threatening civil manner. But what is of concern is that these self-proclaimed "patriotic Americans" are acting in a bullying and often violent manner, thus stripping the opposition of its right to free speech. It's all very reminiscent of the 2000 "Brooks Brothers" mobs who, under the guise of local protesters but actually official GOP goons, disrupted the Miami re-count in the Bush/Gore post-election battle. These rowdy town hall meetings have been overrun by rabid Republicans acting like brutish mobs with the singular goal of preventing the health care debate from taking place. They seek to shout down and drown out the opposition. And that's not acceptible.
Republicans are very good at lying and deceiving in an effort to bolster their cause and frame the issues. Can we ever forget how Sen. John McCain, Sarah Palin and others did their best to portray Obama as a terrorist, socialist and Muslim? What about the "birthers," who insist that Obama's presidency is not legitimate because they believe he's not a U.S. citizen? These disengenuous Republicans fear-mongered to get us into war with Iraq, and now they're fear-mongering again on health care, scaring people into thinking that if Obama's reform succeeds, then the government will dictate the who/what/when/where/why of their personal coverage. They're even scaring ailing senior-citizens into thinking they'll be euthanized rather than to spend wasteful taxpayer dollars keeping them alive. This suggestion is beyond despicable, but not a surprise.
So while the health-scare mobs spread their lies and deceptions, let's set the record straight on a few main points of Obama's proposal:
-There'll be no caps in coverage
-There'll be no exclusions of pre-existing conditions
-There'll be no euthanizing of seniors
-No one has to change their current doctors
-No one has to change their insurance carrier
To be sure, the health care issue is extremely complex. Both sides of the aisle are throwing facts and figures around as they try to convince people that they have Americans' best interests at heart. But in cutting through all the muck, there's one very simple, logical question in determining who's lying and who's not: are Republicans really the party that's gonna protect the old, the sick and the uninsured more so than Democrats? Sounds absurd, right? Yet so many people still allow themselves to become brainwashed by the GOP's deceptive rhetoric.
What's most unfortunate in this whole mess is how so many people continue to be used and manipulated by the GOP. They're the same ignorant lot who believe that Obama's a Muslim, that he hangs out with terrorists and that he was born in Kenya. They are the birthers, the tea baggers and now the health scare fools who've been duped yet again, despite almost 100 years of proof to the contrary, that the Republican Party is the party looking out for the little guy.
I'm not a supporter of the health care disruptors but I am disturbed by the blanket contempt I've seen in the media for people who are exercising their rights. The hypocrisy of the 'elite' commentators is palpable. These commentators assume that only those on the East and West Coasts are intellectually gifted enough to debate this issue. No wonder enormous distrust is brewing in the nation's hinterlands.
Second: Something like 45% of Americans voted for John McCain... so what happened to them after the election... already converted into Democrats by the power of President Obama? Or maybe they've been generally happy with his accomplishments thus far in office and/or disgusted by the nursery school antics of the so-called Republican base?
Third: Even if your 53% against figure were accurate, let's do the math: roughly 45% voted for John McCain... let's assume none of them support reform... now suppose 85% of those voting Obama also support reform... BINGO! Your 53% figure. IMHO the telling thing isn't whether non-Republicans oppose the bill, but rather that a large number of Republican citizens SUPPORTED care reform two months ago, when 70-75% of Americans were in favor of it! I suspect folks probably STILL overwhelmingly support reform, though maybe not the way it's accomplished in this particular bill.
Fourth: How many Americans truly know anything about HR 3200 or any other health care bill? HR 3200 is reportedly 1000+ pages long... how many Americans have read it? How many have read even one page of it? How many even know the name of the bill!?! So... are they really making an informed judgment or reacting to whatever the latest health industry shill said on the radio during their drive to work this morning?
What was this cause that nearly drove him to a heart attack??
what was this 'regular' guy shouting?
"CORPORATE TAXES ARE TOO HIGH!!!!" (seriously)
This remains the most inexplicable thing to me. How does the small man just not get it that he is duped?
The GOP seems to a b use their fears to reach this goal.
You separate the group from the mainstream, so they only hear one message---the one YOU want them to hear. Seemed to work for Jim Jones.
I am sick that the MSM has been spinning this as the GOP wants it to. Walter Cronkite is thrashing in his grave right now.
Look, I know button down Brooks Brothers activists goons, named Wellington or Stanley. Wellington and Stanley are friends of mine. And I'm telling you, Mr. Ostroy, these "hallers" are no Wellingtons or Stanleys. You give Republicans way too much organizational and strategery credit; Sorry to admit it, but we are just not that good. Looks more like a Ross Perot styled set up. But it doesn't really matter, because your piece missed the point.
Granted, the in your face screaming at 80 something year old Michigan (D) Representative John Dingell is really offensive, and even makes the grandfatherly Dingell a sympathetic figure.
But what is important in all this is that we are witnessing sheer terror in the faces of the "hallers" that is caused by the wholesale changes to their medical coverage that Obamacare presents. This is a bill that congressmen/women admit they don't read and the president, with his great powers, can't explain.
That really bugs "hallers" and everybody else. Alot.
"Hallers" are the canaries in the political mineshaft. They signal the explosion that is coming in the political war between the Republican army who are finally girding up their fiscal loins, and preparing an all out assault of the knee wobbling Obama led forces of economic darkness.
Hilarious yet disgusting (loins)
Your lies won't work here.
About which lies do you refer? That you think that all the hallers are Republican operatives?
I am a Republican activist, but I must have been dropped from the "Show up at the town hall meetings and act obnoxious" list or the " Show up at the town hall meetings and ask intelligent, well thought questions" list. I have been notified of neither, nor have anyone in the resistance movement that I know.
You would think that someone would have intercepted a copy of the marching orders from the command central at Republican Headquarters.
The only email that I have rec'd is the one from David Axelrod in the WH asking me to help spread the truth and to notify him of anything fishy.
I must contact control central about the oversight. I must have been bumped in favor of Uncle Marvin and Aunt Bertha.
toronto and Wash DC are nearly the same size. Toronto has 1 fully equipped open heart team-- Washington has 8. Where would you rather have your heart attack? There is a town in Canada having a lottery to see who gets to see a GP-- as reported on ABC, that nasty right-wing network. europe and others are piggy-backing on US innovation; where will the new treatments and drugs come from when we are like them? Want gov health care? go to the VA, or better yet, an Indian reservation.
Every 7 minutes in Canada, someone dies from heart disease or stroke. (http://www.heartandstroke.com/site/c.ikIQLcMWJtE/b.3483991/k.34A8/Statistics.htm)
[E]very minute [in America], another heart attack death occurs. (http://ezinearticles.com/?Heart-Attack-Statistics&id=461293)
Another point you miss is that currently in America, there is already a panel that decides whether you get that hip replacement; it's a private health insurance company that denies you coverage for whatever technicality they can find. So of course, you're arguing against a public choice of insurance, because gov't healthcare (Medicare, Medicaid, TriCare, VA) is so awful. Well, fine, if you hate gov't healthcare, don't take it! But stop preventing the rest of us from trying to join the every other nation of the civilized world that actually cares for its citizens!
How I miss George Carlin during this health care "debate". This country is getting the exact oligarchical control it deserves. I can't wait for the follow-up stories in a year or two of these health care protesters facing some sort of catastrophic illness or injury and going bankrupt and/or dying because the health insurance and pharmaceutical corporations they are unwittingly carrying water for deny them coverage. I think Carlin would have found it to be an irresistibly ironic Malthusian solution to deal with overpopulation and undereducation... and would've made me laugh, too.
Faulty basic premise, but I'll bite anyway...
In answer to the question posed, I pose a counter-question: "With or without health insurance?"
ummm... without health insurance, Toronto.
Connected the dots yet?
Crummy Patriots ...
So we need to:
1. Get rid of our cash for favor election system and go public financing only.
2. Get rid of the insurance companies pretending to be in the health care business.
3. Educate the populace about what is and what is not socialism.
4. Put the old farts that think calling someone a Socialist shames them out to pasture. There is no Socialist threat to America and most Americans have no idea about the one that used to exist..
5. Stop listening to disgraced polititians. They have already proven to be irrelevant and distrustful so we need to ignore them and keep them at the bottom of the social heap.
6. Lean to know the difference between entertainers and leaders.
7. Re-define what a hero is. Heroes are successful. When the hero arrives and saves the day, the town sheffif has already tried and failed. So why do we call the failed sheffif a hero? He failed, that makes him a person who tried and failed, not a hero. The hero gets the job done not just makes a good effort.