The town halls for healthcare that have been happening across the US have been a mess to say the least. The American people are waking up to the idea that the US gov't is not working for the American people. The town halls have been met with boos' and heckling.
Footage below.

[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UonyBfwQaio[/YOUTUBE]

[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qn71-wNccsw[/YOUTUBE]

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yep, good'ol philadelphia, saw these already...pretty standard actually.

[IMG]https://secure.reservexl.net/wwwimg/img/tours/1269-5.jpg[/IMG]

Good to see people taking some kind of action, I whole-heartedly agree.

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Actually, I don't agree with it. And it has nothing to do with my opinion on health care.

Town halls should really be about [I]open debate on the issues[/I], not through heckling and shouting down your opponents. I would much rather see intelligent pro and con debate than brainless patriotism and thug-like behavior.

And don't think that this is some "grass roots" thing that is spontaneously occurring out there; I bet you anything there is a lot of organization to this by coalitions of conservative groups who are emboldened by the attention this is now receiving in the media and on the internet. This is a well-known tactic (made a lot easier through mobile technology), and Democrats would probably be doing something similar if Republicans were in power and were trying to make some big change.

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[quote=Miroslav;775051] And don't think that this is some "grass roots" thing that is spontaneously occurring out there; I bet you anything there is a lot of organization to this by coalitions of conservative groups who are emboldened by the attention this is now receiving in the media and on the internet. This is a well-known tactic (made a lot easier through mobile technology), and Democrats would probably be doing something similar if Republicans were in power and were trying to make some big change.[/quote]

Daily Show had a thing on this last night, actually. Many of the rallying cries you hear are lifted, verbatim, from Fox News personalities' suggestions.

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[URL="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UOLs7Cybnqw"][youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UOLs7Cybnqw[/youtube][/URL]

Hmmm....I don't know you two. This one certainly seems like real citizens to me. They are emotional and they are frustrated. I'm talking about the people in the town hall meeting not the ones outside.

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[quote=Miroslav;775051]Actually, I don't agree with it. And it has nothing to do with my opinion on health care.

Town halls should really be about [I]open debate on the issues[/I], not through heckling and shouting down your opponents. I would much rather see intelligent pro and con debate than brainless patriotism and thug-like behavior.

And don't think that this is some "grass roots" thing that is spontaneously occurring out there; I bet you anything there is a lot of organization to this by coalitions of conservative groups who are emboldened by the attention this is now receiving in the media and on the internet. This is a well-known tactic (made a lot easier through mobile technology), and Democrats would probably be doing something similar if Republicans were in power and were trying to make some big change.[/quote]

Ya maybe or maybe they are just pissed..

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[quote=runningman;775072]Ya maybe or maybe they are just pissed..[/quote] I'm sure they are pissed. After all, the folks behind this are mostly partisan conservatives whose ideas ruled the country for nearly eight years and now find themselves on the other side looking in as Democrats wield power.

But I just think these kinds of antics are ultimately not a productive way to move forward on the complex question of health care reform.

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[quote=Lorn;775068] Hmmm....I don't know you two. This one certainly seems like real citizens to me. They are emotional and they are frustrated. I'm talking about the people in the town hall meeting not the ones outside.[/quote]

Not saying they aren't real people, because there are certainly real people that have legitimate concerns about the health care proposal. What I'm suggesting is that perhaps this isn't as organic as some news outlets would suggest. There is a difference between individual citizens showing up to voice their concerns and an organized group converging upon these town halls, and I think what you're seeing is more akin to the latter option.

Clearly there is organized opposition to the current health care proposal -- nothing wrong with that, btw -- but let's not pretend that all of these folks just happened to show up. That's the point, not that these people are actors or something.

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Toasty nothing is organic now a days.. The Obama movement wasn't organic. The Iran election rioters weren't organic. So why would this be any different?

"The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum." -Noam Chomsky

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[quote=runningman;775087]Toasty nothing is organic now a days.. The Obama movement wasn't organic. The Iran election rioters weren't organic. So why would this be any different? [/quote]

Not expecting it to be any different, but that is exactly the story that is coming from Fox and other right-wing news outlets.

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um...

townhalls typically don't have heckling and shouting...

that is the very point of this thread...they are turing into a "town mess..."

it's gotten to that point.

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^^ I think the real point is to ask: [I]why[/I] are they turning into a "town mess" (or better said, [I]who[/I] is turning them into that)?

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^ever heard of a collective conscious? I've worked in both politics and insurance, people are legitimately pissed off...notice I said people, not dems or repubs or independents. Asking why at this juncture...well I think it kind of insults these peoples intelligence.

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[quote=floridaorange;775164]^ever heard of a collective conscious? I've worked in both politics and insurance, people are legitimately pissed off...notice I said people, not dems or repubs or independents. Asking why at this juncture...well I think it kind of insults their intelligence.[/quote] To me, the insulting thing is insinuating that these hecklers represent the "collective consciousness" of the nation. With 300 million plus people in this nation? I'm skeptical of that. If Americans really were so wholeheartedly united against Obama and his "socialist" agenda, then why did McCain lose the last election? And why was there no heckling and protesting when Bush started the bailouts?

To me, they represent [I]one[/I] particular perspective on the issue, and there are others as well - even if they're not shouting as loudly at this moment.

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[QUOTE=runningman;775087]Toasty nothing is organic now a days.. The Obama movement wasn't organic. [/QUOTE]

Actually, I do kinda have to take issue with that. Obama's campaign was ultimately a model of organization and mobilization, but I can tell you first hand that it really did start out very grassroots, at least here in St. Louis. I attended the very first meeting (and was a charter member) of the St. Louis for Obama group, which was about two dozen strangers, none of whom were affiliated with the campaign in a formal way. We had a number of meetings like that, put together a number of lo-fi events (like a Barack-A-Q, where I smoked up around 45 pounds of pork shoulder), etc. until the official campaign folks came in and essentially used our infrastructure and volunteer base to run the campaign.

Some of the people that I met at that very first meeting ended up being paid staffers for the campaign, and many of us went on to hold non-paid positions in various Obama-focused groups, but at the outset and really up until about a week or so before Tsunami Tuesday during the primaries, there was no "official" Obama presence in St. Louis, just the group of us that had met in an apartment complex's common room on evening a year earlier, and the volunteers we'd recruited since then.

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The one other thing I'll mention on the town hall front is that there is a difference between making sure your voice is heard, and making sure that no voices can be heard, and that no debate be had at all. Seems like the goal here is closer to the latter.

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Ya toasty and not to mention he only got positive media throughout the whole campaign. Never a negative thing about him. Hillary even pointed that out when Barack was going up against her she realized the establishment was behind him. His endorsements that Florida brought up as well is a leading indicator that it was absolutely not organic or grassroots.

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It's actually not that simple RM, the money contributed to campaigns comes in at different times. The way to judge the candidates by contributions or ties to the establishment is more based what happened before the campaign begun and the candidates back-story. Which is a big part of the reason why Obama did win and why he was the right candidate for the job, his ties to the establishment were far less entrenched than his opponents. Obama ran a very well planned and sophisticated campaign, large in part thanks to individuals such as Toasty who may not have normally gotten involved at the grassroots level in order to mobilize their town very early on in the process (btw).

Polls are being taken constantly and advertised by the media on local and national levels which then attracts the bigger institutional donors that are needed to win.

*edit - I meant mobilize not immobilize

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Statistics can always be manipulated, but at least this one recent poll of over 1,000 Americans suggests that the "generally consciousness" of American opposition to the health care reform is actually more like 50/50 split.

[URL]http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/08/05/health.care.poll/index.html[/URL]

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^My overarching point was that townhalls rarely occur in such a fashion, and actually the number of people at them is greater than I would have expected to have seen, but that's just me.

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the real grassroots movement was Ron Paul. He raised a lot of money from american citizens.

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....

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[quote=runningman;775442]the real grassroots movement was Ron Paul. He raised a lot of money from american citizens.[/quote]

And he is completely through now because he called Bruno a queer on camera. :lol: (not that he had much of a chance to begin with)

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what a crock of shit this is.. "Hurt our President..." Well dressed people could be terrorists now.

[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZV84OBtGpSQ[/YOUTUBE]

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[QUOTE=runningman;775579]what a crock of shit this is.. "Hurt our President..." Well dressed people could be terrorists now. [/QUOTE]

To quote Zbigniew Brzezinski, "[y]ou know, you have such a stunningly superficial knowledge of what went on that it's almost embarrassing to listen to you." She's not referring to terrorist acts, she's referring to trying to hurt him politically -- and the well dressed people she's referencing are the participants in the so-called Brooks Brothers riots.

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I think calling the people at the town hall meetings right wing operatives and not real citizens is a lame excuse. Of course the people at the rallies are politically motivated. Most normal citizens are apathetic to political news. And btw, the Democrats are quite good at name calling and ridicule. Will they finally stop talking about Palin? Let it go Libs.

Bottom line is a lot of Americans don't like the health care plan because people don't understand it and it's expensive. And Obama with his boring press conferences can't even explain it well. He uses examples like "take the blue or red pill". I felt like I was watching the Matrix. Ok Morpheus, which pill costs us less in the end? Cost is the other thing that scares people. A trillion here on stimulus and another trillion for health care worries people and that's why people are mad as hell at these town halls.

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[quote=superdave;775606]I think calling the people at the town hall meetings right wing operatives and not real citizens is a lame excuse.[/quote] And who said they weren't real citizens? I know sure didn't. All I said was that (1) these events were probably not as "spontaneous" as they would like you to believe, and (2) out-screaming people at town halls is probably not a very good approach to determining policy, regardless of your political persuasion.

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[QUOTE=Miroslav;775610]And who said they weren't real citizens? I know sure didn't. All I said was that (1) these events were probably not as "spontaneous" as they would like you to believe, and (2) out-screaming people at town halls is probably not a very good approach to determining policy, regardless of your political persuasion.[/QUOTE]

I meant the news is reporting these are strategically placed Republican operatives not you personally. Though it wouldn't surprise me if there was some planning by the right wingers. However, I would bet a large majority of the people are genuine citizens worried about the future of health care. And if this is the case, I could see a big backlash against Obama and his administration for demeaning them.

And as for the loud protesting, why can't they be loud? Some of the exchanges I saw were not as unruly as the media makes you think it was. I didn't see any shoes being thrown or Congressmen running for their safety. Dissent is supposed to be highest form of patriotism or did that change once a Democratic President was elected?

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^^ Well ok, I can't speak for the media, but as for me... again, no one is saying that there should be no dissent. Hey, we're all for dissent - but I personally would prefer it in the context of a dialogue. If people don't like the health care proposal and show up to debate [I]why[/I] they believe it's a bad idea, then I think that's great. If they show up just to disrupt the possibility of [I]any[/I] dialogue, then I don't think that's so "patriotic". I'm sure that's not what has happened / will happen in [I]all[/I] forums of debate for health care and other issues, but it definitely seemed that way in most of the vids that have been circulating out there in the recent days.

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^^Like when George Washington sat down with the British and talked it out..:roll:

I think you have a false representation of your country Miro.

Obama has a new email address you can email if someone is talking bad about his healthcare reform. [email]flag@whitehouse.gov[/email] What a load of shit this is. You can send the comment in and tattle tale on your neighbours. What is this world coming to?

[URL]http://blogs.abcnews.com/thenote/2009/08/gop-senator-white-house-encroaching-on-first-amendment.html[/URL]

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[quote=runningman;775821]^^Like when George Washington sat down with the British and talked it out..:roll:

I think you have a false representation of your country Miro.[/quote] I think you're insane if you think that the status quo method [I]intended[/I] for addressing differences of opinion in America is to have a violent revolution like we did then. Show me where that procedure is written into the Constitution. If this is your understanding of how things work in my country, then please just stay on your Canuck side of the border, thanks.

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I guess we will just see Miro. Your version or the rest.

video of pelosi accusing demonstrators of bringing swastikas.

[URL]http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2009/08/05/pelosi_town_hall_protesters_are_carrying_swastikas.html[/URL]

She is a fucking nut case.

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well i guess she wasnt that wrong::::

[IMG]http://images.huffingtonpost.com/gen/97283/thumbs/s-FTCOLLINS-large.jpg[/IMG]

[URL]http://www.alan.com/2009/08/06/pelosi-is-correctthey-are-carrying-swastikas-at-town-hall-meetings/[/URL]

[URL]http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/08/06/anti-obama-protester-comp_n_252815.html[/URL]

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^^^big deal. polosi is still a nut case anyway. and that photo depicts one perosn out of the 10's of thousands of people showing up becuz there pisseed at govt spending and dont want a gov take over of health care.

the gov seems to never listen to the people, now we are angry mobs and swastika carriers

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how do you know it isn't liberals going out with those images to sabotage a grassroots movement?

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from almost everyone i have talked to, most who voted for obama,they dont like gov health care bill. the gov. does not listen

most want to stop all this gov. wasteful spending: clunkers, taking over the banks and car manufaturers. now they want to control health and it will only cost 1trillion. lmao

wonder if they will be 3x off the estimate like they were with clunkers.

hmmm 3xa trillion. is 3trillion:evil:

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ahh a trillion here and a trillion there pretty soon you are talking about real money.

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[quote=chuckc;776196]^^^big deal. polosi is still a nut case anyway. and that photo depicts one perosn out of the 10's of thousands of people showing up becuz there pisseed at govt spending and dont want a gov take over of health care.

the gov seems to never listen to the people, now we are angry mobs and swastika carriers[/quote]

you need to read the links, try and read the "huffington" link, in there it tells how some of these town halls riots have been promoted by right wingers, you can read some info here::

[URL]http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/08/06/tampa-town-hall-on-health_n_253478.html[/URL]

oh and about the cash for clunkers, people need to get their facts straight and use common sense, the program was successful, you know what, it was more successful than they could of ever anticipated, now, how can you say with a straight face that if something is so damn successful it becomes a failure?? its just fucking ridiculous. its like having a TV sale, and running out of TV's, wasnt that the whole point of the sale?

also RM, as you can see most of the signs people are showing basically say obama is a nazi, like most of right wingers have been saying since he was elected, now, i dont see why dems would be so eager to savotage their own town halls with signs saying what the right wingers have been saying since day one. This has become so damn ridiculous that its just funny, if you google, pelosi swastika, you get at least 8 google pages full of right wing media acusing her of being stupid and naive. Now im not defending her, or Obama for that matter, all im saying is that, shes basically right, people have been acusing Obama of being a Fhurer since he was elected, of how his propaganda is all "nazi like" and now the poor ol little right wingers get all ofended when somebody points that out.

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out of all of the thousands of people that are going to the townhalls you are going to have some wackos. You can't judge the whole group because some stupid idiot brought an SS sign.

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i know what you're saying, all that im pointing out is that she only said " you be the judge, there are people carrying swastikas and symbols like that to a healthcare town hall".

this is a prime example of right wingers grasping for every little detail on the dems, and i know this goes both ways, but i mean, you cannot go and say "obama is becoming hittler" and then when somebody points that out, youre gonna act all ofended and try and deny it.

this is a good read about how mis-informed people are in regard to the whole healthcare thing. [URL]http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/06/AR2009080603854.html?hpid=topnews[/URL]

now like i said, i could care less about any of these town halls, or if people call Obama hitler, all im saying is that you cannot go and criticize one side when your side is doing the same thing.