Tea parties and Town Hall meetings

[Patti]

The most ludicrous comment here is that the birthers, tea-baggers, deathers and their ilk have been "silent, genteel, and polite." They've been nothing of the sort, and obviously aren't interested in an actual discussion. They'd much rather shout "They're gonna kill yer granny!" because the sheeple will buy into it.

Pharmaceutical industry shills and Republican operatives like Tim Phillips and his Americans for Prosperity group have been bussing people across the country to be "grass-roots" protesters. Phillips, of course, is a 9-year veteran of Century Strategies, the lobbying firm made famous by Jack Abramoff and Ralph Reed.

So now, in addition to Birthers, Deathers, and Tea-baggers, we have the artificial, bought-and-paid-for version of grass-roots: Astro-turfers. And it looks like the sheeple are falling for that bit of fakery, too. It might leave a bad taste when and if they discover just how phony it is.

Are you related to Nancy Pelosi?

YouTube - Nancy Pelosi Calls Townhall Protesters Nazis

[DefensiveCarry.com]

[natticarry]

The accusations of thug tactics by opposition are really quite entertaining. They are being leveled by people who supported people who screamed in the streets about the Iraq war and how it was all the Jews fault (not saying all of the bill supporters are this way but the loudest voices against the dissent tended to).

I will point out a few observations I have made.

Most of the chanting came after a congressman responded to a question with an insult or dodging the question.

The anger really ramped up after congressmen accused people who ask questions of not being real people. I understand their anger and I would hope most of you would be angry if someone dismissed your point of view as fabricated. As an aside I have not seen much evidence for the charges of Astro-turf but I have heard of one congressman who yelled at a doctor from his district. If this was all fabricated by big money I would think they would have had to send out a lot of emails and fliers, where are they? Its hard to point to a major conservative website giving out talking points and organizing these event. I can however point to many George Soros supported sites that organize leftist activities.

The violence did not start until union supporters showed up and physically assaulted people. I am not aware of any evidence of people who oppose the bill actually getting physical unless they are battered first.

As for the shouting and chanting. I find it some what tacky when it lasts for more than 4-5 seconds, but I don't think its undemocratic to respond with disapproval to a poor answer. Have any of you ever seen parliamentary procedures from other countries. Unpopular statements are routinely booed and popular statements are supported with cheers. Heck don't even look to other countries just watch some re-enactments based on the town hall meetings before the revolution. Crowd cheers and jeers have long been a part of our tradition. The only part I don't agree with is crowds not quieting down eventually for the speaker to respond.

What I find most off putting is the congressmen who loose composure, turn bright red and scream at the crowds with anger. They are supposed to be professionals and respect opposing view points. If they are truly backed against a wall and not allowed to speak then leave. I think they should still attempt to have their meetings and if they degrade into something non productive I (and I would think a majority of people) would not fault them for leaving. Screaming uncontrollably at a crowd is very unappealing and I bet some of this footage will be used against them in their election campaigns.

[natticarry]

Thuggish behavior is what I am seeing, and it won't enhance the goals of those who engage in it. It just makes them look like fools. What is being done is extremely inappropriate, and anti-democratic.

Think Brown Shirts in the early 1930s Germany.

If the real Brown Shirts showed up I think the Union folks would fair far better against them than the groups of elderly people you are accusing of being Brown Shirts.

I actually find the accusations of these groups as being Brown Shirts insulting because it seriously minimizes what the SA actually did. I don't see anyone destroying property and robbing businesses yet.

[edr9x23super]

A good friend of mine was in Bryan, TX yesterday at the office of Chet Edwards, a democrat representative in that area, and he tole me via email that there had to be at least 400 people outside his office demanding a town hall meeting, to which the groups were willing to sign a written agreement to not be rowdy or abusive, Rep. Edwards was free to walk out at any time he felt threatened. On his part he had to agree to give answers to questions that were asked. His office staff made the excuse that he was not in the office, and therefore could not agree to any town hall meetings, but they would notify him and he would get back to them.

Some excuse..... As for the Union thugs and ACORN toughs as well as the Black Panther wannabes? This is my response to them: If you interfere with my first amendment rights, you will learn about the second.......

[hybrid]

rodc13

forgive me if I take your comments as holier than thou attitude.

there is lots of dems going too, to bad nobody pays attention to the normal dems and reps, only to the crazy ones.

funny you talk about propagandistic stuff when you are using the insults of said propaganda.

remember divide and conquer they're doing that to us. it's working we're fighting among ourselves.

Some excuse..... As for the Union thugs and ACORN toughs as well as the Black Panther wannabes? This is my response to them: If you interfere with my first amendment rights, you will learn about the second.......

thats exactly what they're looking for.

[F350]

Hopyard-

The proposed law forces no one to do anything in regard to consultations. It only makes a provision to pay a doctor once each 5 years if the patient decides that they wish to consult with the doctor.

This provision is actually a protection for patients. Note where it says that there will be a measure of adherence to orders for life
sustaining treatment. In other words, if your desire is to preserve
your life to the bitter end, against all odds, there will be a mechanism to measure adherence to such directives.

You write crotchety enough to be of an age where you should be able to remember the first seatbelt laws passed. Remember, in most states we were assured that it was "only a secondary offense, you will never be stopped just for not wearing your seatbelt; there will never be check points”.

Well here we are today, seatbelts are a primary offense in most states, not only can you be pulled over if a cop happens to see you, there are “safety checkpoints” like DUI checkpoints and there are cops sitting on overpasses with binoculars looking for people not wearing seat belts.

Sure THIS BILL may not have any end of life requirements in it, but what about the 8th or 9th revision?????????????????????

Power grabbing politicians NEVER go for their ultimate destination with the first bill, they prefer to put the frog (us) in cool water, then start turning up the heat till they boil us alive.

[Rock and Glock]

The proposed law forces no one to do anything in regard to consultations. It only makes a provision to pay a doctor once each 5 years if the patient decides that they wish to consult with the doctor.

Please check Medicaid/Medicare. If they will not reimburse, or cover, it is illegal to obtain same, IIRC. Just a distant memory from my Mother's mammogram fights with the government.

Everyone, absolutely everyone, should have a Living Will and a Directive to Physicians, and should give those documents to their doctor so that they are in his records. All the proposal does is make provision to pay the doc for the time involved.

I agree. Why does the Doc get paid, unless he renders service. Is this what you mean? Not for just filing the Advance Directive?

This is one provision which has been distorted for political gain by frightening the gullible.

Who cares.......Although agreed

If you don't want to prepare a living will and don't want to prepare an advanced directive, and don't want to give those instructions to your doctor, or discuss end of life issues with your doctor, there is nothing in the proposed legislation that forces you to do so.

Patient choice is preserved.

OK. Maybe it shouldn't be, to play the devil's advocate. A lot of idiots and dolts spend billions on health care when there's no hope whatsoever. Just look at the percentages of healthcare dollars spent in the last 90 or 120 days of an individual's life without a change in the outcome, mortality or morbidity. Maybe that should change, although I hesitate to have the government step in. Personally, I'd prefer my wife or my children to make that decision if needed. We as a society should spend less on the terminally ill and and just have hospice step in where appropriate, subject to family approval?

[sigman232]

The most ludicrous comment here is that the birthers, tea-baggers, deathers and their ilk have been "silent, genteel, and polite." They've been nothing of the sort, and obviously aren't interested in an actual discussion. They'd much rather shout "They're gonna kill yer granny!" because the sheeple will buy into it.

Pharmaceutical industry shills and Republican operatives like Tim Phillips and his Americans for Prosperity group have been bussing people across the country to be "grass-roots" protesters. Phillips, of course, is a 9-year veteran of Century Strategies, the lobbying firm made famous by Jack Abramoff and Ralph Reed.

So now, in addition to Birthers, Deathers, and Tea-baggers, we have the artificial, bought-and-paid-for version of grass-roots: Astro-turfers. And it looks like the sheeple are falling for that bit of fakery, too. It might leave a bad taste when and if they discover just how phony it is.

Anyone who uses the terms: Birthers, Deathers or Tea-bagger has no business criticizing ANYONE for being sheeple.

[Hopyard]

I agree. Why does the Doc get paid, unless he renders service. Is this what you mean? Not for just filing the Advance Directive?

All this provision does is make sure the docs get paid for the time they spend meeting to discuss living wills and advanced directives. We shouldn't expect them to take 15 minutes or so to listen without getting paid.

The provision actually assists the docs. It assists people wanting
to discuss the issue.

Objections can be raised to almost anything using a slippery slope argument, or using the argument that so and such will only lead to bad things in the future because somehow legislation sometimes seems to do exactly that. If society stayed with that approach nothing could ever be accomplished.

[Hopyard]

A good friend of mine was in Bryan, TX yesterday at the office of Chet Edwards, a democrat representative in that area, and he tole me via email that there had to be at least 400 people outside his office demanding a town hall meeting, to which the groups were willing to sign a written agreement to not be rowdy or abusive, Rep. Edwards was free to walk out at any time he felt threatened. On his part he had to agree to give answers to questions that were asked. His office staff made the excuse that he was not in the office, and therefore could not agree to any town hall meetings, but they would notify him and he would get back to them.

Some excuse..... As for the Union thugs and ACORN toughs as well as the Black Panther wannabes? This is my response to them: If you interfere with my first amendment rights, you will learn about the second.......

This is too political and I hesitate to respond, especially since it is a local congressional district campaign issue.

Edwards is a pro 2 A dem. He is a strong advocate for the Veterans and the Veterans Hospital system. He is a strong advocate for
the military installations nearby. He is a strong advocate for Texas A&M and Blinn college.

He holds a great deal of seniority in Congress and within the party in power. If he is shoved out in the next election our district will be back where it was for too long. We will have another useless freshman rep. who is a member of the party out of power. That is a sure fire way to guarantee that constituents won't get effective constituent services and that the district won't get the financial resources that otherwise would flow to it.

Don't know what the references to either ACORN or Black Panthers are about. This is mostly a rural district.

And BTW, he lives in Waco, 80+ miles from the Bryan office. That sounds like a fairly good reason for him to not be around when the mob showed up.

[edr9x23super]

Hopyard, if the man isnt there to answer questions, or wants to have a telephone town hall where the connection can suddenly be lost, or broken at his whim, he is still not answering to the people he works for.

I don't care how he feels about the 2nd amendment, or anything else. The whole problem folks have nationwide with all of their representatives is the fact that they have stopped answering specific questions, and are now afraid to face their employers, the American people who are demanding answers.

So I don't care if he is in Waco or Luckenbach or Iraan...... What I say to all of these Congressmen I will borrow from one of our fellow members, Sixto:

"Man up and face us, Cowards!

[UnklFungus]

What we are seeing is frustration amongts voters.

The people that have been largely silent and thus ignored for years are waking up and they don't like what they see.

The politicians are so used to being worshiped by their followers that they aren't capable of understanding that things are out of control, and they are the reason.

They don't know how to speak to crowds because they haven't had to. They have spoke at them, doing pretty much whatever they dang well please, with no accountability whatsoever .

We have a President and an administration that is hostile to the country that elected them, and even those that voted for "change" are beginning to see the error of their ways. The whole process had been subverted by Socialists and anyone worth their salt will not stand idly by and let it happen without a fight.

Its always been said that there are three boxes.

The soap box,
the ballot box,
and then the cartridge box.

If something is don't soon, this pent up anger and frustration is only going to get worse.

The hired goons that try to intimidate are only the tip of the iceberg.

The irony of it is, that this administration WANTS violence to take place because it will serve their purposes for even further subvert of our way of life.

I see no good in the future, its only going to get worse.

I made this point on another forum. I think that this is exactly what is wanted. I feel that some of the BG's on both sides at these are planted, cuz that is exactly what I would do if I were manipulating the citizens into my evil plot.

So many movies and even animated movies have done just this. I think that the shouting needs to stop. It is playing right into the hands of the politicians with their plans of conquest.

Go to the meetings, certainly, but don't dress like some media hyped stereotype, and keep it professional and under control. How may movies have played out just like this, wherein people were planted to stir things up, just to get the people frantic and frustrated into making bad choices? Usher in a state of martial law, or some version of it and then it is set, match game! Keep it professional, I understand the frustration, believe me I do, but yelling and screaming isn't going to help.

[natticarry]

Using the excuse that a member of congress has seniority as a reason to not vote them out is terrible. This is how corrupt politicians are created. If they have no fear of being voted out of office because of their seniority then there is no reason for them to ever listen to their constituents. As long as they keep the money flowing into their district to the detriment of other districts all over the country. Its hard to believe that we have come so far in this country that principals are secondary to the amount of money your representative can shovel into your district. This is the same kind of logic as a battered women uses to decide to stay with their man because he buys them nice gifts after he beats them up.

[Hopyard]

Using the excuse that a member of congress has seniority as a reason to not vote them out is terrible. This is how corrupt politicians are created. If they have no fear of being voted out of office because of their seniority then there is no reason for them to ever listen to their constituents. As long as they keep the money flowing into their district to the detriment of other districts all over the country. Its hard to believe that we have come so far in this country that principals are secondary to the amount of money your representative can shovel into your district. This is the same kind of logic as a battered women uses to decide to stay with their man because he buys them nice gifts after he beats them up.

Actually, your point makes good sense as a general idea, but it makes no sense for our particular district at this particular point in time. We have lived through a series of "new" folks who were able to do nothing for our district, even when they were members of the majority in Congress. At least one former critter lived 200 miles from our district, so much for the gerrymander, and the other better represented affluent Houston suburbs.

We have a pro 2A moderate to slightly conservative rep who knows how to get things done for the major constituent groups in our district; specifically veterans and the universities. Why give that up?

What we will get in return is someone who will at best also be pro 2A but ineffective in protecting our veterans from hospital closings, reduced benefits, and all the other indignities that are sometimes proposed and heaped upon them.

If the issue is who will best represent our district, and who has the clout to actually deliver good stuff to our district, then we don't need to change and shouldn't.

There is a saying, " all politics is local," and if we *here* want our local interests looked after, we need to stay with the guy we got.

I do wish that threads like this, and our discussion, were closed and deleted by the Mods and managers here. We either have a no politics rule with teeth, or we have a little politics under the tent flap, and then bad feelings.

It is one thing to discuss policy--e.g., the nitty gritty of health care reform proposals, and yet another to discuss a specific congressional campaign which is of NO interest to anyone outside of our district.

[JD]

Well this thread is just PACKED of 2A related info...


NO NON-GUN RELATED POLITICS!