How would you calm down the town halll protesters

[Dempublicents1]

That's hardly the same. Congress is supposed to represent the will of the people, not lord over them.

And the people need to be able to get their points to their congressmen in a civil manner. Acting like a 3-year old should mean that you get treated like a 3-year old.

Just on the record, I can hardly see how this is a "Legislation by tantrum" when a solid majority of people are against this bill. This isn't Legislation by Majority, this is Legislation being force fed down American throats, and most are pushing back, concerned, and enraged that hardly anyone in Congress read all 1000 pages.

It's a minority who are out there throwing a tantrum. There certainly are legitimate concerns - and people voicing them. But the people being discussed here are the ones throwing a tantrum and standing in the way of civil debate.

And we are supposed to act "civil"? The one thing that the people can't stand is to be talked down upon by their own representatives.

And the solution is to shout down the congressmen and keep more rational opposition from actually discussing the issue?

How would you like for your Congressperson to say "Sorry, but we are better and understand the problem, your opinion against this matter is not important".

My congressman and senators basically say that to me every time I send them a letter. It doesn't mean I go down to their office or to a town hall meeting and shout them down. It means I keep sending the letters.

The only "3-year olds" in this situation are the Congresspeople, wining about how the people that voted for them exercise their free speech in front of their noses.

So the people who disrupt meetings - sometimes even meetings that are not health care related, refuse to be civil, fling racial epithets, and paint swastikas are acting like calm, rational adults?

[Zoingo]

Just on the record, I can hardly see how this is a "Legislation by tantrum" when a solid majority of people are against this bill.

Since the majority is "solidly" against this bill, you MUST be able to post a link to bear out that contention. Otherwise you're just blowing hot air.

(HINT: Opinion pieces that make statements that you agree with does not constitute "proof". We need to see hard numbers.)

Gladly, although I can't see why I am forced to propose a link when I counter your argument, but when you make your claim you show no proof what so ever. Fine, as long as I can wipe the smile off of your face.

Opposition to Healthcare Plan dips to new low

[Kynchile]

I found a editorial from a Democrat that might help explain why even the Democrats can't unite on this thing.

Aug. 12, 2009 | Buyer's remorse? Not me. At the North American summit in Guadalajara this week, President Obama resumed the role he is best at -- representing the U.S. with dignity and authority abroad. This is why I, for one, voted for Obama and continue to support him. The damage done to U.S. prestige by the feckless, buffoonish George W. Bush will take years to repair. Obama has barely begun the crucial mission that he was elected to do.

Having said that, I must confess my dismay bordering on horror at the amateurism of the White House apparatus for domestic policy. When will heads start to roll? I was glad to see the White House counsel booted, as well as Michelle Obama's chief of staff, and hope it's a harbinger of things to come. Except for that wily fox, David Axelrod, who could charm gold threads out of moonbeams, Obama seems to be surrounded by juvenile tinhorns, bumbling mediocrities and crass bully boys.

Case in point: the administration's grotesque mishandling of healthcare reform, one of the most vital issues facing the nation. Ever since Hillary Clinton's megalomaniacal annihilation of our last best chance at reform in 1993 (all of which was suppressed by the mainstream media when she was running for president), Democrats have been longing for that happy day when this issue would once again be front and center.


But who would have thought that the sober, deliberative Barack Obama would have nothing to propose but vague and slippery promises -- or that he would so easily cede the leadership clout of the executive branch to a chaotic, rapacious, solipsistic Congress? House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, whom I used to admire for her smooth aplomb under pressure, has clearly gone off the deep end with her bizarre rants about legitimate town-hall protests by American citizens. She is doing grievous damage to the party and should immediately step down.

There is plenty of blame to go around. Obama's aggressive endorsement of a healthcare plan that does not even exist yet, except in five competing, fluctuating drafts, makes Washington seem like Cloud Cuckoo Land. The president is promoting the most colossal, brazen bait-and-switch operation since the Bush administration snookered the country into invading Iraq with apocalyptic visions of mushroom clouds over American cities.

You can keep your doctor; you can keep your insurance, if you're happy with it, Obama keeps assuring us in soothing, lullaby tones. Oh, really? And what if my doctor is not the one appointed by the new government medical boards for ruling on my access to tests and specialists? And what if my insurance company goes belly up because of undercutting by its government-bankrolled competitor? Face it: Virtually all nationalized health systems, neither nourished nor updated by profit-driven private investment, eventually lead to rationing.

I just don't get it. Why the insane rush to pass a bill, any bill, in three weeks? And why such an abject failure by the Obama administration to present the issues to the public in a rational, detailed, informational way? The U.S. is gigantic; many of our states are bigger than whole European nations. The bureaucracy required to institute and manage a nationalized health system here would be Byzantine beyond belief and would vampirically absorb whatever savings Obama thinks could be made. And the transition period would be a nightmare of red tape and mammoth screw-ups, which we can ill afford with a faltering economy.

As with the massive boondoggle of the stimulus package, which Obama foolishly let Congress turn into a pork rut, too much has been attempted all at once; focused, targeted initiatives would, instead, have won wide public support. How is it possible that Democrats, through their own clumsiness and arrogance, have sabotaged healthcare reform yet again? Blaming obstructionist Republicans is nonsensical because Democrats control all three branches of government. It isn't conservative rumors or lies that are stopping healthcare legislation; it's the justifiable alarm of an electorate that has been cut out of the loop and is watching its representatives construct a tangled labyrinth for others but not for themselves. No, the airheads of Congress will keep their own plush healthcare plan -- it's the rest of us guinea pigs who will be thrown to the wolves.

With the Republican party leaderless and in backbiting disarray following its destruction by the ideologically incoherent George W. Bush, Democrats are apparently eager to join the hara-kiri brigade. What looked like smooth coasting to the 2010 election has now become a nail-biter. Both major parties have become a rats' nest of hypocrisy and incompetence. That, combined with our stratospheric, near-criminal indebtedness to China (which could destroy the dollar overnight), should raise signal flags. Are we like late Rome, infatuated with past glories, ruled by a complacent, greedy elite, and hopelessly powerless to respond to changing conditions?

What does either party stand for these days? Republican politicians, with their endless scandals, are hardly exemplars of traditional moral values. Nor have they generated new ideas for healthcare, except for medical savings accounts, which would be pathetically inadequate in a major crisis for anyone earning at or below a median income.

And what do Democrats stand for, if they are so ready to defame concerned citizens as the "mob" -- a word betraying a Marie Antoinette delusion of superiority to ordinary mortals. I thought my party was populist, attentive to the needs and wishes of those outside the power structure. And as a product of the 1960s, I thought the Democratic party was passionately committed to freedom of thought and speech.

But somehow liberals have drifted into a strange servility toward big government, which they revere as a godlike foster father-mother who can dispense all bounty and magically heal all ills. The ethical collapse of the left was nowhere more evident than in the near total silence of liberal media and Web sites at the Obama administration's outrageous solicitation to private citizens to report unacceptable "casual conversations" to the White House. If Republicans had done this, there would have been an angry explosion by Democrats from coast to coast. I was stunned at the failure of liberals to see the blatant totalitarianism in this incident, which the president should have immediately denounced. His failure to do so implicates him in it.

http://www.salon.com/opinion/paglia/200 ... own_halls/

[Dempublicents1]

Here is a Rep. from my town taking a boisterous question. And they wonder why they aren't respected by the people. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-L3FnWNkIzU

I hardly think it's common for a rep to be using a cell phone while taking a question.

That said, unless there's a really damn good reason for it, that was inappropriate, and if I were the person with the mic, I would have said something like, "It's ok, I'll wait for you to finish your call...."

[Buxtahatche]

How?

LISTEN TO THEM WHEN THEY SAY THEY DON"T LIKE WHAT YOU ARE GOING TO DO WITH THEIR MONEY!
That is the job of a representative, after all... to represent the views of their district!

[Sibirsky]

11 million total. I'm sure some of em have health insurance.

I call bullshit. How can you even know that there are only 11 million? Did they sign in? I'll go with my numbers. The good thing is that many are leaving for the greener pastures of home, now that the economy is down.

Or you could go with this 41 million number

http://www.theamericanresistance.com/re ... mbers.html

[UnhealthyTruthseeker]

How?

LISTEN TO THEM WHEN THEY SAY THEY DON"T LIKE WHAT YOU ARE GOING TO DO WITH THEIR MONEY!
That is the job of a representative, after all... to represent the views of their district!

Except that listening is a two-way street, and with the number of people opposed to the proposed plans that believe ridiculous nonsense about what the plans say, it's clear that a lot of the opposition hasn't been listening.

[Sibirsky]

11 million total. I'm sure some of em have health insurance.

I call bullshit. How can you even know that there are only 11 million? Did they sign in? I'll go with my numbers. The good thing is that many are leaving for the greener pastures of home, now that the economy is down.

I am going to go with 20 million
http://ohmygov.com/blogs/general_news/a ... llion.aspx

[Antilon]

Here is a Rep. from my town taking a boisterous question. And they wonder why they aren't respected by the people. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-L3FnWNkIzU

I hardly think it's common for a rep to be using a cell phone while taking a question.

That said, unless there's a really damn good reason for it, that was inappropriate, and if I were the person with the mic, I would have said something like, "It's ok, I'll wait for you to finish your call...."

I'm calling shenanigans on that video. For one, the comments are disabled ( I wonder why?) and the lighting on the wall doesn't seem to match the speaker and the Rep. Also, the Rep would have been at the podium.

[Zoingo]

It's a minority who are out there throwing a tantrum. There certainly are legitimate concerns - and people voicing them. But the people being discussed here are the ones throwing a tantrum and standing in the way of civil debate.

Obviously, you don't understand what 52% is. Your so called "minority" represents what a majority also feel, but are too afraid to say it in pubic. Only these people have the courage to stand up, vent what they are saying, and then get standing ovations by the crowd.

And the solution is to shout down the congressmen and keep more rational opposition from actually discussing the issue?

And the solution is to silence concerned Americans who want to have their say? Sounds more like censorship rather than acting "civil"

My congressman and senators basically say that to me every time I send them a letter. It doesn't mean I go down to their office or to a town hall meeting and shout them down. It means I keep sending the letters.

Again, if sending letters doesn't work, this is there only way to get their message across.

So the people who disrupt meetings - sometimes even meetings that are not health care related, refuse to be civil, fling racial epithets, and paint swastikas are acting like calm, rational adults?

Surly you can back your claim as to a few meetings that weren't Healthcare related that were interrupted? And again, freedom of speach, the same argument the Democrats used to back protectors during the Veitnam War.

[Sibirsky]

Form an American KGB. Anyone who speaks out would be woken up in the middle of the night and force to say they commited a crime. Than kill him or her for the crime. That's what I would do if I was Mr. Obama!

The KGB = CIA. You're forgetting that we actually have rights.

[UnhealthyTruthseeker]

Protests aren't really intelligent anyway. No actual rational discussion gets done. They are a hinderance to legitimate debate. Just a bunch of people shouting semi-intelligible rhetoric.

[Sibirsky]

Umm...if you want the protesters to stop shouting about the bill, the most effective way to stop them from shouting is to simply defeat the bill, no problems and no complaints.

Which would explain the large (percentage of the audience-wise), local turnout. Brings new meaning to "vocal minority".

Real effective legislative process. "Legislation by tantrum." Next time your kid acts up, THE thing to do is give him what he wants.

That's hardly the same. Congress is supposed to represent the will of the people, not lord over them.

Correct. Except the government forgot that they are the government FOR the people.

[Dempublicents1]

It's a minority who are out there throwing a tantrum. There certainly are legitimate concerns - and people voicing them. But the people being discussed here are the ones throwing a tantrum and standing in the way of civil debate.

Obviously, you don't understand what 52% is. Your so called "minority" represents what a majority also feel, but are too afraid to say it in pubic. Only these people have the courage to stand up, vent what they are saying, and then get standing ovations by the crowd.

I understand that there are different levels of opposition, and that it is therefore unlikely that the vocal minority truly represents all of those who are opposed. Meanwhile, 52%? Statistically, that's basically dead-even.

And the solution is to shout down the congressmen and keep more rational opposition from actually discussing the issue?

And the solution is to silence concerned Americans who want to have their say? Sounds more like censorship rather than acting "civil"

No one is suggesting that anyone is silenced. We're just saying they should be civil when they speak.

My congressman and senators basically say that to me every time I send them a letter. It doesn't mean I go down to their office or to a town hall meeting and shout them down. It means I keep sending the letters.

Again, if sending letters doesn't work, this is there only way to get their message across.

There is no way to "get the message across" other than to keep trying. My representatives, like most, are so tied to the mandates of their party that it doesn't matter what I say. Most of the time, I don't even get a response that makes sense when I send a letter. I've received a response telling me that he will take my opinion into consideration if a bill ever comes up for a vote - when the letter I sent was actually informing him that I was disappointed in how he *did* vote.

But, guess what? I don't feel the need to go throw a temper tantrum and act like a child. I'm not painting swastikas on anyone's property, nor am I disrupting meetings with other purposes to voice my concerns.

So the people who disrupt meetings - sometimes even meetings that are not health care related, refuse to be civil, fling racial epithets, and paint swastikas are acting like calm, rational adults?

Surly you can back your claim as to a few meetings that weren't Healthcare related that were interrupted? And again, freedom of speach, the same argument the Democrats used to back protectors during the Veitnam War.

Look up David Scott.

Oh, and freedom of speech doesn't mean that someone isn't acting childish (nor does it cover threats or vandalism).

[Zoingo]

Protests aren't really intelligent anyway. No actual rational discussion gets done. They are a hinderance to legitimate debate. Just a bunch of people shouting semi-intelligible rhetoric.

Protesters = Exercising First Amendment rights.

Nothing Says they have to be civil about it , and the same thing I assume applies to the protesters claiming President Bush was a Nazi and would suspend all of America's freedoms?

[UnhealthyTruthseeker]

Protesters = Exercising First Amendment rights.

Nothing Says they have to be civil about it , and the same thing I assume applies to the protesters claiming President Bush was a Nazi and would suspend all of America's freedoms?

Just because they are allowed to doesn't mean they should, nor does it mean that they're intelligent. I also support a person's right to not wear a helmet. Doesn't mean that I think it's a good idea.

[Lunatic Goofballs]

I found a editorial from a Democrat that might help explain why even the Democrats can't unite on this thing.

-snip-
http://www.salon.com/opinion/paglia/200 ... own_halls/

Camille Paglia. A fascinating woman, who I bet you wouldn't ever agree with on anything ever again.

[Sibirsky]

Here is a Rep. from my town taking a boisterous question. And they wonder why they aren't respected by the people. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-L3FnWNkIzU

What a bitch! I am talking about the Congresswoman of course. The cancer survivor speaker is wise.

[Sibirsky]

lots and lots of machine guns.

And maybe a tank, just for good measure.

You wanna give the protestors lots and lots of machine guns??? And a tank?

Hell, I'd protest for that!

Hell, I'll start protesting too. I call drivers seat for the tank.

I call gunner.

[Katganistan]

I'd say Listen you didn't set up an appointment and other people want peace so shut your trap and be civilized. That should shut them up

They have a right to be heard. They do not have a right to disrupt. If they continue shouting and chanting over others, I would have them arrested for disorderly conduct.

So long as they ask their questions/make their statements calmly during the Q&A, they MUST be allowed to participate.

[Sibirsky]

Just on the record, I can hardly see how this is a "Legislation by tantrum" when a solid majority of people are against this bill.

Since the majority is "solidly" against this bill, you MUST be able to post a link to bear out that contention. Otherwise you're just blowing hot air.

(HINT: Opinion pieces that make statements that you agree with does not constitute "proof". We need to see hard numbers.)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... 02176.html

[Zoingo]

I understand that there are different levels of opposition, and that it is therefore unlikely that the vocal minority truly represents all of those who are opposed. Meanwhile, 52%? Statistically, that's basically dead-even.

Not even close, if you paid attention to the above link, you would find that alot more people abstain and alot less now approve of the healthcare plan.

Link again

No one is suggesting that anyone is silenced. We're just saying they should be civil when they speak.

Yet Having Congresswomen saying they have to use "Their Mother's voices" is more civil as the people saying "Kill This bill!"? Highly hypocritical that One person can be allowed to dumb down hundreds who are protesting against them.

But, guess what? I don't feel the need to go throw a temper tantrum and act like a child. I'm not painting swastikas on anyone's property, nor am I disrupting meetings with other purposes to voice my concerns.

Does it even concern you that it was only one senator out of 99 others? I don't see Capitol hill having a Giant Swastika painted on it. If it is as Childish as you claim, why has it happened to the only Senator who accused the protesters of "hijacking the meeting" even when a solid majority of the people of Douglassview's questions were against the bill and vented just as much as the protesters?

Look up David Scott.

Oh, and freedom of speech doesn't mean that someone isn't acting childish (nor does it cover threats or vandalism).

[/quote][/quote]

I already know of the situation, see above.

And freedom of speech doesn't cover vandalism, but it does cover protesters and other people who are acting "childish" at these meetings. Looking people down only inflames them more, I can say that you are "childish" for disagreeing with me, is that fair to you?

[Kynchile]

I found a editorial from a Democrat that might help explain why even the Democrats can't unite on this thing.

-snip-
http://www.salon.com/opinion/paglia/200 ... own_halls/

Camille Paglia. A fascinating woman, who I bet you wouldn't ever agree with on anything ever again.

I know it. I am stunned that there is still some common sense among the liberals. I really don't know what to say; I thought they all drank the koolaid.

[Lunatic Goofballs]

11 million total. I'm sure some of em have health insurance.

I call bullshit. How can you even know that there are only 11 million? Did they sign in? I'll go with my numbers. The good thing is that many are leaving for the greener pastures of home, now that the economy is down.

Or you could go with this 41 million number

http://www.theamericanresistance.com/re ... mbers.html

Well, at least it's a source, and kudos for at least providing one which is more than some are capable of.

Having said that, I've examined their methodology and found it flawed and unscientific. I suspect I'm not the only one, so I'll check around and see if I can find a refutation of their methods.

[The_pantless_hero]

Protests aren't really intelligent anyway. No actual rational discussion gets done. They are a hinderance to legitimate debate. Just a bunch of people shouting semi-intelligible rhetoric.

Protesters = Exercising First Amendment rights.

Nothing Says they have to be civil about it

Yes, it does. You have the right to peaceably assemble. Key word: peaceably.