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Townhall Forums Unmask Dark Side of American Culture
The town hall meetings being held across the country by Democrats to revive Obama’s gasping healthcare plan has opened a door that Americans from all corners of the political spectrum hoped would stay closed…
The right may have gotten more than they bargained for this time.
Whatever opponents to Obama's healthcare plan had in mind for the Democrats' town hall meetings this summer, one thing is crystal clear: Those turning up at the forums across the nation are upset about a lot more than healthcare. Whether or not they've been duped by right wing talk radio hosts or, as one article posted at CommonDreams asserts, they are little more than "useful idiots," what is apparent is that by exploiting the most reactionary elements of the far right to mobilize their base, the Republican opposition has managed to unleash a far more sinister force than "anger over Obama's healthcare plan" (that benign phrase so faithfully being echoed in the mainstream media). In fact, if William Kostric, who showed up on August 11 at one such meeting in New Hampshire with a loaded 9 mm pistol strapped to his right hip is any indication, the already-feeling-marginalized classes who attended the meetings en masse are not only mad as hell, but they're ready to do something about it.
Despite conservatives' dismissive - and in some cases disdainful - attitude toward the left's charges of, among other things, racism, it was pretty obvious on August 11 that protestors who showed up at the New Hampshire town meeting had their own agenda. Emboldened by instructions posted on right wing message boards by the same lobbyist-run groups who orchestrated the anti-Obama tea parties earlier this year, some felt free to blurt out epithets that most Americans thought - or at least hoped - had long since vanished from the American lexicon. And notwithstanding FreedomWorks' Max Pappas insistence on the talk show circuit that his and other groups like them are ‘grassroots,' a leaked internal memo reportedly put out by pro-industry groups Americans for Prosperity and FreedomWorks and subsequently posted at Governor Howard Dean's website is revealing. The memo, titled "Rocking the Town Halls - Best Practices" spells out in no uncertain terms how members should be infiltrating town halls and harassing Democratic members of Congress:
"We here in Fairfield County Connecticut conducted an action at Congressman Jim Himes' Town Hall meeting in May 2009," the memo begins. "We believe there are some best practices which emerged from the event and our experience which could be useful to activists in just about any district where their Congressperson has supported the socialist agenda of the Democrat leadership in Washington." Among the memo's instructions:
- Artificially Inflate Your Numbers: "Spread out in the hall and try to be in the front half. The objective is to put the Rep on the defensive with your questions and follow-up. The Rep should be made to feel that a majority, and if not, a significant portion of at least the audience, opposes the socialist agenda of Washington."
- Be Disruptive Early And Often: "You need to rock-the-boat early
in the Rep's presentation, Watch for an opportunity to yell out and
challenge the Rep's statements early."
- Try To "Rattle Him," Not Have An Intelligent Debate: "The goal is to rattle him, get him off his prepared script and agenda. If he says something outrageous, stand up and shout out and sit right back down. Look for these opportunities before he even takes questions."
Thomas Jefferson, Meet William Kostric
Such explicit instructions go a long way toward explaining why the right wing, pistol-toting Kostric felt just fine about attending a town hall forum with his 9 mm on display for the whole world to see. It also explains why another white, middle-aged male felt perfectly safe spewing ugly hate speech through a megaphone. "Why are we bankrupting this country for 21 million illegals who should be sent on the first bus one way back from wherever they came from," he frothed. "Send them home with a bullet in their head the second time. Read what Jefferson said about the tree of liberty. It's coming baby."
The vitriol doesn't end there. The Hill reported that still another protestor in Hagerstown, Maryland on August 12, where Senator Ben Cardin (D-Md.) was attempting without much apparent success to sell the Democrats' healthcare plan, was spotted holding up a handwritten sign with the words, "Death to Obama" scrawled on it. It's worth noting also that slave-owner president Thomas Jefferson, who back in 1787 penned the words, "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of tyrants and patriots," is very popular with this crowd. The quote apparently worked for Kostric, who, along with his 9mm, carried a self-styled placard bearing the words, "It's time to water the tree of liberty."
The socialist-branding of Obama by his opponents has further stoked the hate. "Throughout the first six months of his administration, President Obama - perhaps one of the most politically cautious leaders in contemporary history - has been routinely portrayed as a radical by his opponents on the far-right," observes anti-racist activist and writer Tim Wise in an article posted at CounterPunch.
Wise, who garnered my un-ending respect back in the 1990's during a series of live on-air phone interviews during my days as a radio news producer, writes, "Reducing all government action other than war-making to part of a larger socialist conspiracy, the right contends that health care reform is socialist, capping greenhouse gas emissions is socialist, even providing incentives for driving fuel efficient cars is socialist. That the right insists upon Obama's radical-left credentials, even as they push an Obama=Hitler meme ... only speaks to the special brand of crazy currently in vogue among the nation's reactionary forces.
"It is not," he explains, "a simple belief in smaller government or lower taxes that animates the near-hysterical cries from the right about wanting ‘their country back,' from those who have presumably hijacked it: you know, those known lefties like Tim Geithner and Rahm Emanuel."
An Unharmonic Convergence
Wise believes that what differentiates Obama from any of the other big spenders who have occupied the White House is "principally one thing - his color." And, says Wise, "it is his color that makes the bandying about of the ‘socialist' label especially effective and dangerous. Indeed, I would suggest that at the present moment, socialism is little more than racist code for the longstanding white fear that black folks will steal from them, and covet everything they have ... the current round of red-baiting is based on implicit (and perhaps even explicit) appeals to white racial resentment ... Unless this is understood, left-progressive responses to the tactic will likely fall flat. After all, pointing out the absurdity of calling Obama a socialist, given his real policy agenda, will mean little if the people issuing the charge were never using the term in the literal sense, but rather, as a symbol for something else entirely."
Americans would do well to consider Wise's words carefully as the health care fiasco all but consumes the first African American president. Properly managed by the left, conservatives' tactics could just backfire - big time. Assuming no one gets gunned down in coming months - and that's assuming a lot - it just might turn out to be a good thing that the right and their talk show poison-pushers have managed, by exploiting the simmering anger at the party base, to change the subject.
Despite the ongoing denial seemingly from every corner of the political spectrum, America's history, as it turns out, still demands to be reckoned with. For better or worse, the ‘healthcare debate' has unmasked the darkest corners and least explored aspects of American culture. And, shameful as they are, we will have to deal with them. Racism and violence are proving yet again to be powerful forces - and Americans can't simply wish them away. They were only posing as a conversation about healthcare reform.- Posted in
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88 Comments so far
Show AllExcellent article. I've been saying for months that the real motivation behind the current (right-wing) attacks on everything Obama is nothing more than thinly veiled, old-fashioned American racism. That analysis really explains a lot, for example that none of the attacks have to make any sense.
Either you are a troll, a plant, a hack, or an ignoramus...
Check out Glen Ford's "Black Agenda Report.Org"...
Then we can talk...
I've read some articles on CD from BAR. So please be more specific about what you find problematic with my post before throwing names. Then we might have something to talk about.
I basically agree with the article that racism is behind a lot of the right-wing attacks on Obama, masked behind a lot of other shrill words and nonsense. What's the big controversy? Or are you one of those imbeciles that just writes vituperous comments without thinking?
Notice that I was talking about right-wing attacks on Obama. Obama is being attacked by the left as well, for other reasons, and I wasn't talking about those at all.
All this will get sorted out in the next civil war.
Thanks Humamba because my comment referred to the "war on Negroes" following the civil war. The current "Dark Side" is kindergarten stuff compered to the WON.
Unmask? Man, you must have been napping since your birth.
These Townhall disruptions are a fake sideshow designed to shift the debate away from the fact that Americans want single payer.
If the Townhalls hadn't framed the debate between the Crazies vs. the public option, single payer might have been mentioned.
If the Townhall disruptions weren't desired by Democrats, any PR media handler would tell these politicians that if the hecklers can't be controlled - don't have the meetings, don't go. I don't recall Town Hall meetings over the Patriotic Act or the FISA bill, now why is that?
But the "Town Halls" create the convenient illusion (for both parties) that there is a real fight over healthcare. So the option becomes either the corporate sponsored "public option" or nothing at all. Single payer vanishes from the debate.
When you have a fake opposition party you get a fake compromise.
hoped up: I'm not so sure "if the Townhall disruptions weren't desired by Democrats," but I'm pretty that the whole stinking stable of right wing vituperation is so "desired" for the rather obvious reason that they make a "victim" of Obama and divert attention from the miserable failures of his policies both domestically and internationally. In a perverse way, Limbaugh and company may be the tail that wags the dog for Democrats to salvage any political popularity. Notice how, for example, the Obama-worshipping website Alter-Net is virtually obsessed with article after article attacking every idea that emanates from the right wing noise machine. If they are so bad, why are they made the focus of so much attention and given another megaphone for broadcasting their lies? They say that if the Devil didn't exist we'd have to invent him, and there's strong suspicion in my mind that the Democrats nourished the right wingnuts if they didn't actually invent them.
By the way, Sandy LeonVest, congratulations on getting an article published by Common Dreams; as opposed to the debacle a few days back when they posted and then removed another article without any explanation to readers. Does anybody else remember that?
"I'm not so sure "if the Townhall disruptions weren't desired by Democrats,""
Why do you think they continue to hold them? (BTW I think perhaps some lower ranking Dems are told to hold these meetings and then get caught off guard. But the DNC desires the disruptions.)
"but I'm pretty that the whole stinking stable of right wing vituperation is so "desired" for the rather obvious reason that they make a "victim" of Obama and divert attention from the miserable failures of his policies both domestically and internationally."
I completely agree. The "miserable failures of his policies" is a success to them and a failure to us. But what you've written also seems to apply perfectly to the Townhall discussions. The Dems certainly love to play the victim.
"If they are so bad, why are they made the focus of so much attention and given another megaphone for broadcasting their lies? "
Because it frames the debate. In this "debate" there is only the "public option" or own currently unsustainable system, but no real talk about socialized medicine. Conveniently, the Crazies have already mislabeled Obama's plan (which corporations help draft) as "socialist". So any talk of actual socialized medicine is something people are taught to view as totally extremist.
The "public option" is really a right-wing concept (much like cap and trade) but when you call it left-wing, that means that you must create an an even more extreme right-wing ideology in order to maintain the false duopoly of power. This is done to avoid having a one party state (an obvious dictatorship) or a multi-party state (harder to control). We have only one option for healthcare because the Republicans have offered no alternative. Yet this is being called a "debate" because of the hecklers. It's fascism masquerading as democracy.
You might not be aware that they often hold town-hall meetings, they just have gotten more publicity this time.
Yes, I'm aware they orchestrate these "Town Hall" meetings whenever they want to generate PR for a particular issue. Democrats and Republican both do it. I think this pathetically folksy label started under Jimmy Carter. It used to just be called meeting your Senator, Representative, candidate, President etc...
What's your point?
You aren't seriously going to argue that they have no choice but to hold these meetings right now, are you?
At its best, the US has evinced another culture. The Civil Rights movement found ground here, for example, and prevailed in changing radically the overtly racist culture that many of us were born into. Once there was a "War on Poverty" rather than the current war on the poor. Women found ways to escape from the domestic prisons that had confined many of them, and to enter professional lives that had been closed before.
There has been a counter-current, present even in the early (although partial) principles of "inalienable" human rights to life and liberty, and in the Bill of Rights also.
From about 1980 on, the nation has fallen into an evil case, it is true. Our great question now is how to find the way to revive what was good here and to build on it, rather than continuing our deterioration into a dreadful, violent, corporate-fascist state.
Listen, I don't understand why you guys are even trying to find a deeper meaning in what is going on in these townhall meetings.
Over here in Europe, we are watching it in the news and even the Washington correspondents of European TV and radio stations are completely flabbergasted.
If most Americans (no apologies!!) weren't as whoppingly uneducated and ignorant as they are, it would be clear for everyone that what is being used are CLASSICAL fascist tactics.
Look up Goebbels' tactics in the Third Reich.
First you find a derogatory name for what you dislike (in this case, this dumb-ass "socialized medicine" epithet), then you spread lies wherever you go via your reliable channels who all keep repeating your smears and your lies.
Goebbels (I better mention it, this being an American audience: He was Hitler's propaganda minister who introduced a new state of the art re propaganda) famously quipped that if you keep repeating a lie, it will eventually be perceived as the truth.
This is exactly what is going on in the US today.
What really, really bugs me is that the other side is using kid gloves. Man, I never thought that I'd ever wish a bunch of us Europeans on these fascists! You don't seem to be able to deal with them. We'd make mince meat of that crap!
Obama himself and his entire crowd are not up to the task right now. They are too well-behaved, FAR too nice!
Believe us over here: Kick them, and kick them really hard! Don't be nice. NEVER! They are fascists. Being nice is a luxury you can't afford! Wasn't it enough how they tried to have a coup d'état via an extremely flimsy impeachment case when Clinton surprisingly won the elction and unseated a sitting Rep? What else does it take (thinking of Palin's prose during the election campaing..) to kindle any fervour among those who don't want the US to really become a fascist state??
They emulate the brownshirts (which one could prove easily, the facts are all there - where are all these great filmmakers to show you?).
Use the word! Use it! Use it whenever any of these fascist talk-shows open their mouths! Sue them for wanting to abolish democracy and have a fascist country! (No, it isn't quite yet, but it's nicely on its way, I think.)
They've been trying so hard for so many years! When will you finally stop them and kick them really, really hard?? Chase them instead of being chased by them! Act instead of reacting!
Very interesting. So now you see the two sides of the US (though there are variations) that figure in political controversy.
There's the side that's angry and tired and loud-mouthed and eternally ignorant and utterly hopeless.
And there's the side that's nice. They mean well—I think—but they're scared, too scared or simply unable to make their points with clear logic.
Logic, however, has little weight with the angry-and-tired-and-loud set.
Perhaps the US is about nothing so much as duality. It's either this or that, black or white, so to say, with no room for subtlety. Emotion rules above all else, and emotion gets triggered by a select set of words.
You are very fortunate to live in Europe. There is intelligence there, with some culture and tradition still intact.
Not everyone who is angry with Obama is a fascist.
Personally, I'm glad that there has been loud opposition to ObamaCare because it will most likely force people who aren't covered by employers to purchase lousy McInsurance from the crooked insurance industry. It turns the Federal government into muscle for the insuarnce companies.
The right wing healthcare protestors are accomplishing a good thing, just for the wrong reasons.
The comparison to brownshirts is weak. Brownshirts were incredibly violent. as yet the righties have not sunk to that level.
By villifying the right wing protest tactics, timid liberals pave the way for demonizing left wing protest.
Yes, I condemn the racism, but I applaud the militant tactics. As some radical left (as opposed to squishy liberal)commentators have noted, the left could learn a thing or two from the right wing tactics.
Agreed. That they should get just as angry, that is.
But rest assured, if the state interferes in health insurance, your ridiculously high premiums will go down because there will finally be competition - I wouldn't be able to afford health insurance in America. It's several times more than I pay.
And where I live, a job without health and pension insurance is per definiton an illegal job.
I am unaware that the standard of living over here is below that of the US as a result, though. On the contrary: In Western Europe at least, we don't even know how to spell "slum". Even the banlieues of Paris look like Palm Beach compared to some of the shanty towns I've seen in the US - and all the kids that like to burn cars in Paris occasionally do generally have health insurance, mind you.
Whereas most of the ones who occasionally riot in the US probably don't.
@ dreamjoehill August 14th, 2009 7:36 pm. You wrote: "Personally, I'm glad that there has been loud opposition to ObamaCare because it will most likely force people who aren't covered by employers to purchase lousy McInsurance from the crooked insurance industry. It turns the Federal government into muscle for the insuarnce companies."
So far, Obama has insisted he would not sign a health care bill without a public option. A public option would be the first step in bringing full single-payer universal health care to this country, which is why the Corprocracy is fighting it so hard.
You wrote: "The right wing healthcare protestors are accomplishing a good thing, just for the wrong reasons."
No, they aren't. They are witting or unwitting stooges of right-wing astroturf organizations just wasting time, hoping to turn public opinion against any health care reform.
You wrote: "The comparison to brownshirts is weak. Brownshirts were incredibly violent. as yet the righties have not sunk to that level."
No, it isn't. The Nazi brownshirts, before engaging in actual street violence when Hitler consolidated his power, often attended the political meetings of other parties with the intention of disrupting the proceedings and intimidating the political opposition by shouting down the speakers, just as these Teabaggers do today. I have no doubt that blood will run at one of these town halls before the summer's out as some crazed neonut attacks one of the Dem bystanders.
You wrote: "Yes, I condemn the racism, but I applaud the militant tactics. As some radical left (as opposed to squishy liberal)commentators have noted, the left could learn a thing or two from the right wing tactics."
Sure, the right and left yelling 'fascist' at each other will solve everything. The right-wingers are exposing themselves for the fringe crackpot racists they are and standing out of the way as the remnants of the GOP falls flat on its face is not such a bad idea.
I agree, twincamalfa: the lack of grey (instead of just black and white) in the US has been puzzling and disquieting for a long time. Not good at all.
We had the same kind of black and white thinking in Europe during the 1920s and 1930s. I hope - but am not sure - that people have learned from that experience.
With youngsters knowing less and less about history, I am not 100% sure that that lesson will linger on forever in Europe. That's why the negative example of the presently culturally dominant country in the world, i.e. the US of A, is so damaging.
That's a bad role model for the kids all over the world right now. Because they'll imbibe it nevertheless.
Sorry, to puncture your sense of superiority Araquin, but there is still lots of black and white thinking in Europe. Regarding Muslims. Regarding immigration. Regarding Muslim immigrants. Regarding race.
For example, for all of the US's flaws regarding race, black athletes do not get monkey sounds made at them. Especially not in major professional athletic events. Such overt racist behaviour is totally unacceptable in the US. Yet this happens in EU countries.
"If most Americans (no apologies!!) weren't as whoppingly uneducated and ignorant as they are, it would be clear for everyone that what is being used are CLASSICAL fascist tactics."
Sure, no apologies needed. It's true. The idiocy of Americans makes it easy to institute fascism. The "ill gotten gains" of American don't hurt either. Our leaders are just rolling in guns and money. Our police state and our propaganda systems are second to none.
But I wouldn't let Europe off the hook just because America has the means to be a worse monster. For example, with the tidy compliance of it's citizenry the UK has permanently rolled back the clock to 1984. And what about Medvedev, Berlusconi, or Sarkozy, aren't they fascists as well?
But their opponents are far more vociferous than in America!! And no, they don't try to "understand" them!
Re Medvedev: Russia isn't a democracy, don't forget that. We call that a "democrature", from "dictature" or something like it for "dictatorship" in many European languages.
With Sarkozy, I am not so sure, though. No, I wouldn't call him a real fascist. He's right-wing on some issues and then left-wing on others. He's a genuine populist, I'd say - so far.
Let's say he'd be far more outspoken and on the attack if HIS health insurance plan got heckled by fascists the way Obama's is being hackled in the US. Sarkozy would be the first one to call their tactics fascist and prove it with ample examples from the past. He takes no prisoners, when he's angry.
Something I right now wish Obama would do.
"Let's say he'd be far more outspoken and on the attack if HIS health insurance plan got heckled by fascists the way Obama's is being hackled in the US."
I'm not sure where you're coming from, are you saying Obama is NOT fascist?
To call the hecklers fascists is fine. But they don't even know what the term means. They are just brainwashed Americans pumped up on FOX News and the neurotoxins in their food supply. However, when Obama lets the pharmaceutical and insurance industries help him craft legislation that denies socialized medicine (which a majority of Americans surprisingly support) in order to support their profit motive instead, that's a clear example of self-aware fascism.
With regard to France, certainly it's harder to strip people of healthcare through privatization than to never give it to them in the first place. I admit I know very little about Sarkozy's healthcare reforms beyond his efforts to end national health care for foreign residents.
But I have no doubt that Sarkozy is a corporate stooge. What would you consider his left-wing views? His support for separation of Church an State seems more like veiled xenophobia of Muslims. His weak opposition to the war in Iraq was tempered with statements like "it is bad manners to embarrass one's allies or sound like one is taking delight in their troubles." And, of course, France also still has troops in Afghanistan through NATO.
Also I don't see why Russia has a reputation as being any more or less democratic than most major European countries I see a greater suppression of civil rights in places like the UK or Italy. I have no faith in the integrity of elections in any oligarchy. Russia's not a "real" democracy, but where is?
To claim that Russia is not less democratic than the western EU countries is simply put, utter ignorance. Opposition campaigners who say things that the government does not like do not end up assassinated in the western EU countries. They do in Russia.
And I say this as someone who loves Russia.
"utter ignorance. Opposition campaigners who say things that the government does not like do not end up assassinated in the western EU countries."
Utter ignorance.
David Kelly RIP 1944–2003.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Kelly_(weapons_expert)
How about you read your own link?
And read up on Anna Politskovskaya, Natalia Estemirova, Zarema Sadulayeva, Alik Dzhabrailov, Stanislav Markelov, Anastasiya Baburova, Lev Ponomarev, just for some examples in the meantime.
"How about you read your own link?"
I have. Have you?
"Anna Politskovskaya, Natalia Estemirova, Zarema Sadulayeva, Alik Dzhabrailov, Stanislav Markelov, Anastasiya Baburova, Lev Ponomarev"
Lev Ponomaryovis, contrary to your claim of assassination is still very much alive (he got beat up). Anastasia Baburova may have been killed by the Russian state security services, but it also seems reasonable to assume she was killed by a neo-Nazi group.
All these murders are unsolved. Much like Dr. Kelly (though if you can say it obvious who killed Anna Politskovskaya, I have no trouble saying the UK colluded in the killing of Dr. Kelly).
Most of these journalists were killed for the coverage of the Chechyan War not for coverage of normal Russian politics.
How many journalist have been killed (unsolved) in Iraq or Afghanistan? Because I just don't see much of a difference between attacking someone in front of their house and deliberately shelling journalists in the Palestine Hotel.
"New York, December 18, 2008—For the sixth consecutive year, Iraq was the deadliest country in the world for the press, the Committee to Protect Journalists found in its end-of-year analysis."
http://cpj.org/reports/2008/12/for-sixth-straight-year-iraq-deadliest-nation-for.php
"If most Americans (no apologies!!) weren't as whoppingly uneducated and ignorant as they are, it would be clear for everyone that what is being used are CLASSICAL fascist tactics."
As a whoppingly uneducated American perhaps you should be reminded which societies fell for fascism, hook line and sinker , needing us to rescue your sorry effete asses.
But it was a fairly close call - the largest Nazi organisation outside of Germany was America's "Bund", after all. No coincidence IMO.
America is falling for fascism more and more every day. And since America's mythology - false!! - amounts to being the world's eternal do-gooders, your defences are down.
So you better watch out!
Europe will be crumbling into strife long before here.
If anything it's just because you folks are SO Good at it.
We exported the ones who are best at it to America, don't forget that.
Now boys, play nicely. We may have to help each other someday. And there are enemies of reason who are much less educated than either of you; save some of your ire for them.
Rage and cursing may feel good, but we need level heads and calm in order to deal with the days ahead.
@ okfalcon August 15th, 2009 2:20 pm, on behalf of Common-Dweebs, I refuse to accept that insult. Mr. Dweebs is as good an enemy of reason as you'll find anywhere.
Ahh yes how typically ignorant and uneducated. The Nazis were defeated by the US, the great defender of Freedom.
Nope. The Nazis lost because Hitler was stupid enough to get into a war with the Communist USSR. Anyone getting into a war of attrition of with the USSR / Russia is going to lose. Because of the logistics of fighting in Russia. And any land war in Russia inevitably becomes a war of attrition.
I'm not asking this as any kind of question to put you on the spot, but I still feel it needs to be asked because I honestly don't think that we have any idea what we're doing at this point:
What specifically would you do differently in order to chase these mouthbreathers off and put them back below the rock they crawled out from under?
@ Iconoclast August 16th, 2009 3:25 pm. Good question, and here are some answers collected via the Innertubes.(Some of this has been tried, BTW):
1. Have people sign in with their full name and address when they enter the town hall. Teabaggers are loathe to give out their names and addresses; some, I understand, have turned around and left when asked for this info. If they refuse to provide this info, they are not admitted.
2. Using a digital camera, photograph all attendees. It helps if the photographer is wearing a suit and tie and looks 'official.' The teabaggers are less likely to be disruptive if they know someone has their name, address and photo.
3. Let people know up front you have a 'three strikes' rule. If you are told by the speaker to let them answer and you continue to interrupt with shouting, or interfere with an answer from another questioner, that's one 'strike.' Three strikes and you're ejected.
4. Ask people as they come in if they are representing some group or how they came to find out about the meeting. The answers may be surprising. Make sure the local and national media are aware of who the disruptive protestors are and what group(s) they represent.
5. The speaker should also ask each person wishing to speak for their name and town. If they are not from the district, tell them to wait until those from the district have had a chance to speak. If they refuse to provide this info, have them ejected.
sierra7
"....But the "Town Halls" create the convenient illusion (for both parties) that there is a real fight over healthcare. So the option becomes either the corporate sponsored "public option" or nothing at all. Single payer vanishes from the debate."
That's the crux of the whole false, "town hall meetings" over health care.
I'm for Universal Single Payer Health Care. Period. We were told early in the game that there is/was no way it would be considered.
Business Week Mag (a real "lefty" rag)8-17-09 has an article about the insurance companies already (para) Hi-Fiveing each other because they will just make more money with the Obama Plan (the plan that if passes will continue to genuflect to the big money of the Pharma/Insurance/Banking industries.
I watched some of Sen Cardin's "town hall" meeting and how can you debate when the ground rules truly forbid that honest debate?
The town hall meetings were a set-up to give some voice to some opposition but not all because the main health care, favored by most Americans, is "off the table."
Our government just shows how corrupt they all are.
(I'm a registered non-partisan voter)
Think about this:
An unstable Guy is so pissed off cause he can't get laid, he walks into a gym and guns down three women.
Now imagine an unstable Guy, or group of Guys, who are being told that 'liberals' are trying to kill their grandmother, that 'liberals' want to take their 'freedom' and 'guns' away and put non-liberals in FEMA internment camps, that 'liberals' are evil anti-American fascists/Marxists/socialists who want to murder babies in order to sell their stem cells to anti-Catholic scientists... that liberals are literally the 'enemy,' and there is only one way real Americans deal with enemies - we shoot first and avoid taking responsibility for our actions as long as possible...
And you thought that Guy who couldn't get laid was pissed off, eh?
Bill Maher was only partially right. American's aren't necessarily stupid as much as they are kept ignorant by the oligarchy and it's useful idiots.
Even since Edward Bernays -- who created a PR campaign that persuaded large segments of the public that miserly tyrant John D. Rockfeller was a 'good guy' because he gave away twenty bucks worth of dimes to poor kids in staged 'press opportunities' -- but especially in the last fifty years, America has been subjected to a very well-funded marketing campaign to convince them that their interests are the same as the corporations and wealthy elite that prey on them and use them, employing every trick that behavior modification strategies and motivational psychology can summon up. Unlike any society in history, we are bombarded with this tripe constantly, with few voices of dissent.
We already had a substantial economic collapse that should have taught us what is truly in our best interest, as it did in the 1930s, but in today's 'dumbed-down' world where good dancers are confused with great musicians, we apparently need a stronger lesson. As always, history awaits with a sledgehammer to provide one.
Helloooo? Any "progressives" home here on CD? It appears that we are again getting distracted from what's really going on here, you remember, the $700 billion theft last November, and I believe Obama thrust a much larger one on us called a "stimulus".
I also believe that we never did find that $2 trillion missing from the pentagon budget which Rumsfeld reported on September 10, 2001. (the day before 9/11)
Please, stop bickering back and forth between right and left as it's obvious they're both in cahoots with the insurance/financial/defense/ad nauseum industries. Don't you people look at who funds our Dem & Repub Congressional Reps? (hint: Goldman Sachs was Obama's 3rd largest donor, hello?)
I'm sorry, but I have to agree with poster Araquin in the ignorance of our citizenry. Not many are aware of the theft of America's treasury and natural resources at the hands of the corporations who really own Congress.
All our battles of health care, the environment, you name it, pale in comparison with our Repub/Democrat federal government's desire to institute fascism. Why do you think the Patriot & Military Commission's Act, as well as habeas corpus, haven't been reinstated as part of our rights?
People, open your eyes and see that all this "health care reform" is simply another distraction (albeit a life and death one perhaps) from what's really going on; the enslavement of the American People and the theft of our financial and environmental wealth.
nativetongue.miami: You said it succinctly. Unfortunately, we continue our apartheid here at home and and fund it abroad.
"It appears that we are again getting distracted from what's really going on here, you remember, the $700 billion theft last November, and I believe Obama thrust a much larger one on us called a "stimulus"."
If you've been here long enough, you'd realize that this gets discussed so often. This article is on a different topic. Let's try to stick to the topic please.
I see you didn't get my point so I'll be more blunt. As several others have pointed out in their replies here, FASCISM has silently crept into the American way of life. Until we strip the "personhood" of the Corporation, we will continue on our destructive path with our enslavement to them.
I don't even know why this article is here when the single payer plan has been taken off the table. If it's off the table and your Congressional Rep doesn't try to put it back on the table, who does that show they're working for?
If a president can give away $700 billion to Wall St/Auto/Insurance industries while 80% of constituents say don't do it, who does that show you our federal government is working for?
I don't know why people insist on thinking their government cares about them when all the signs point the other way.
What about our billion dollar defense industry? How do they get all that money when we don't see a fraction of that going to education?
Please, someone here prove me wrong on this.
With these Right Wing nutjobs, all one needs to do is give them a rope, sit back and relax and watch them hang themselves!
Oh, Begonia, don't sit back and relax too long. They may not hang themselves...but me, or you...
Can you imagine how people will be at each other's throats if and when the food supply dwindles? Look out!
Obama should take a long look at these folks because they represent the 30% of America that hates everything about him. He should stop thinking that he can ever change this. These folks want him gone and a portion are more then prepared to get rid of him if necessary.
A well-written article, and welcome. I might add though, that for a lot of us out here in the rest of the world - the one that America likes to deny the existence of except as it constitutes a threat or an exploitable area for U.S. hegemony and profiteering - it appears that many Americans cherish nothing so much as their ignorance. A less enlightened country would be hard to find, never mind who has what agenda. You did touch on this, Araquin, and thank you, because the mind-bending arrogance of Ignoramus Americanus ought to be spotlighted more often. I also agree with you that the left needs to kick back at these right-wing wackadoos. And kick back at that filthy 'Christian'. It is high time that the disgusting respect shown for religion in the U.S. got an overhaul. Make Hitchens' 'God is not Great', Dawkins' 'The God Delusion' and Sam Harris' 'Letter to a Christian Nation' required reading in schools.
Now listen here, 'common-dweebs'. What's this shit about 'effete asses'? Is your testosterone level in need of checking? Suffering from a surfeit of what you think is good ol' American masculinity? You may not have the intellectual capacity to understand this, but for starters, Europeans' asses, effete or not, are what they sit on, not what they try to think with, as is the case with too many Americans. I'll remind you of something mentioned in a NY Times theatre review of a couple of years back: there is a GIANT problem in the U.S. with 'the dangerously limited ways Americans have codified masculinity.' A good part of the reason your country is going down has to do with the demonization and brutalization of not only women (i.e. currently in your military), but of the feminine and its contribution to human life and felicity, and its necessity to the salvation of what's left of your country. I'd suggest that if you want to get taken seriously and avoid being criticised for being a brain-dead misogynist, you read 'The Chalice and the Blade', and Marilyn French's 'Beyond Power.' You plainly regard Europeans as 'effete' because your hyper-masculinistic culture and you sorry excuse for an education system have not provided you with a sense of BALANCE - the Yin and Yang, old cock - of which there is a much more highly evolved sense in much more of Europe.
And if YOU are not effete, where the hell were you when the Bush/Cheney gang were working overtime on the continuing and allegedly Jesus-sanctioned destruction of your alleged rights, your constitution and your shit-heel excuse for a democracy? Were you marching on Washington to demand real accountability on the day those scum released the fiction entitled 'The Report of the 9-11 Commission'? At least Europeans oppose fascism. You take it lying down, because you still think there's some American dream to be had, you have misguided reverence for your presidents and your country's self-identification as a heavily-militarized ass-kicker.
In short, stop being part of the problem with your bullshit homophobic attitude about the effete, the feminine, and what it means to be a man. It's a new millennium - try coming out of the cave.
That is essentially what your point about dualism touches on, twincamalfa, I think. Not only the evils of gender dualism, which give rise to the sickening displays of brutish male domination and aggression which are at the heart of the downfall of the United States (and any other nation, including European, which can't get its crew-cut head out of its patriarchal ass), but the other forms of dualism in America which provide the ignorant masses with their excuses for hatred.
And I think you're right, Humbaba, it'll likely take a civil war or worse to sort this shit out. America is famously resistant to getting a clue about getting its shit together and being a citizen of the world. Their nation-state kind of egotism and 'exceptionalism' and their bullshit 'Sergeant Rock' idea of themselves will ensure that they go down, worse than Rome.
There is only socialized healthcare. Anything else in modern America will contribute to the destruction of the country. Inasmuch as the American economy is inextricably linked to everyone else's, the ROTTING of the American public due to its being refused appropriate care by forces which only want to line their own pockets, supported by a mass of imbeciles brainwashed into believing that anything else is un-American, will lead to an instability which is genocidal to the American people, and a crime against humanity. YOU HAVE A SOCIALIZED MILITARY, for fuck's sakes.
Socialize healthcare now. Full goddamn stop.
I was planning to say a few well-chosen words, but upon reading your comment, Dude, you've said it all.
Thank you.
Likewise... I second that...
WOW.
I ought to copy and paste this and send it to all Americans I know.