Health Care, Free Speech, and the American Way

Have you ever seen someone deftly waving their arms in the air in a futile effort to dissuade a tenacious insect which seems hell bent on getting in the unfortunate person's face? It is analogous to the way in which the Obama administration and Congressional Democrats have been dealing with the town hall 'mobs'. Despite the efforts at all levels of government, including the state run media, to characterize the angry citizens showing up at town hall meetings as a manufactured, racially motivated, fringe effort to sabotage health care reform, the Democrats have lost control of the debate.

A new Rasmussen poll indicates that 54% of Americans now say that passing no health care reform bill would be better than passing the plan now working its way through Congress, and that 51% fear the government more than they fear the insurance companies when it comes to making their health care decisions.

This situation is completely unacceptable to the left wing 'collective', being accustomed as they are, to controlling the debate through Utopian platitudes alone. The left believes that there is a critical subtext connected with the town hall dissent which must be addressed, i.e., unmoderated free speech.

In a recent NY Times piece, James Fishkin explains the problem this way;

"The Congressional town-hall-style meeting, which developed as a cost-effective way for time-pressed members to hear from constituents, also rests on an illusion: that a district of 650,000 potential voters can be represented by the unscientifically self-selected who decide to show up. Instead, these amorphous, unpredictable meetings have become open invitations for interest groups and grass roots campaigns to capture the public dialogue."

I suppose that Mr. Fishkin must not be a fan of free elections. After all, what is a free election but the majority being represented by a minority of 'unscientifically self-selected who decide to show up' at the polls to vote.

Having demonstrated that he has his finger firmly placed on the very pulse of the problem, Mr. Fishkin offers what he believes to be a viable solution;

"But there is a way of organizing town halls that would offer lawmakers representative and informed feedback about their constituents’ major concerns: a deliberative poll. Whereas ordinary polls represent the public’s surface impression of sound bites and headlines, deliberative polls bring together a scientifically selected microcosm of a lawmaker’s constituents under conditions conducive to thinking about issues. In effect, an entire Congressional district really can be put in one room."

"These deliberative polls may, on the surface, look a lot like the current town halls — a lawmaker and constituents sharing their positions and asking each other questions. But a lot of hard work goes on behind the scenes. First, a survey identifies the range of attitudes and demographics in the district, before inviting a randomly selected, representative sample of constituents to attend. A random sample cannot be captured by people with intense interests volunteering themselves. Second, to facilitate discussion, participants are sent balanced briefing materials about the issues to be discussed ahead of time."

"When they first arrive at the deliberative poll, attendees answer a confidential questionnaire assessing their positions, before being divided up for small-group discussions. This is key: in the current town hall format, shrill voices can easily silence the rest. But during a deliberative poll, trained moderators make sure that every voice is heard and that the group carefully and thoughtfully narrows in on its most pertinent and pressing policy questions. When all the participants finally assemble with the lawmaker, the result is a serious and productive conversation well beyond what we’ve seen in town halls lately."

Leave it to a Stanford professor of communications to come up with a brilliant and incredibly expensive way of crushing free speech. In times past, tyrants suspended free speech in a much more cost effective manner; under pain of death. By the time that the American left contrives all of the devious, stealthy, and expensive ways necessary to silence all dissent, the resulting system will collapse under its own weight.

America was born in an argument. The debate over independence was so volatile that in some instances it estranged family members permanently. Independence would never have been declared if the services of 'trained moderators' had been employed to promote mutual understanding in the debate. What has been taking place in town hall meetings across the country is not un-American as Nancy Pelosi would have everyone believe. Nothing could be more American.

Flag@WhiteHouse.Gov

There is no limit to the level to which liberal hypocrisy will rise. As average Americans take the time to attend the scheduled town hall meetings of their elected representatives in order to raise, often very passionately, their concerns over the proposed Health Care bill; the left wing media, Congressional leaders, and the White House wasted no time in trying to demonize them as GOP plants, a mob, racists, swastika carrying Nazis, potential domestic terrorists, and un-American.

So what if the protests are organized! Organized dissent is something which the left has practiced for years, and at many of those events, the term 'mob' would certainly be appropriate. However, unlike what is typical of left wing activism, no cars have been overturned, no fires set, and riot police have not been needed.

Pelosi's comments where she describes seeing protesters "carrying swastikas" was so ridiculous that much of the MSM is ignoring the story, and here is a good reason why:

Right Wingers with Swastikas

Left Wingers with Swastikas

Yep, no hypocrisy here, right! Of course, the libs would have to search long and hard to find a right wing sign which embodies the level extremism displayed in this sign;

So much for the 'potential domestic terrorist' charge.

And, on the subject of racially motivated action at the town hall protests, the only clear example of which was actually perpetrated by members of the left. Purple (SEIU) is the new brown (SA).

At this writing, Matt Drudge is working on a story as follows;
"Pelosi/Hoyer op-ed in Monday USATODAY calls townhall protesters 'un-American'... Developing..."

UPDATE 08/10/09: See USA TODAY op/ed here.

In answer to the un-American charge which is being leveled I think Hillary Clinton (gag) said it best;

"I am sick and tired of people who say that if you debate and you disagree with this administration somehow you're not patriotic. We should stand up and say we are Americans and we have a right to debate and disagree with any administration." - Hillary Clinton, 2003

Hypocrisy aside, the purpose of all of these charges is to direct attention from the complaints of the protesters, to the motives of the protesters. The left has been successful to this end, thanks to their willing accomplices in the press. But, there is a plan B.

On Aug. 4th, in the White House Blog, the WH announced the 'snitch' address where one may report so-called health care disinformation;

"There is a lot of disinformation about health insurance reform out there, spanning from control of personal finances to end of life care. These rumors often travel just below the surface via chain emails or through casual conversation. Since we can’t keep track of all of them here at the White House, we’re asking for your help. If you get an email or see something on the web about health insurance reform that seems fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov."

Using a tactic familiar to every dictator throughout history, i.e., inhibiting free speech though the threat of being ratted out by ones neighbors, ol' Purple Lips has surpassed any perceived usurpation of civil rights perpetrated by the Bush Administration.

"Socialist Taking Over Our Country"

The Presidential Debate last Tuesday night was supposed to be in a "town hall meeting" style. It was a real snoozer! The problem was that the questions were too heavily screened. McCain does exceptionally well in a real town hall style forum and had the debate been a more impromptu format, John McCain most certainly would have won it handily. The video below is from a real town hall meeting recorded earlier today in Wisconsin.




Certainly this type of lively interaction between the audience and the candidates is something that the Democrats wanted to avoid. Obama is ahead in the polls and they just needed to maintain the status quo. Tom Brokaw's performance as moderator was very helpful to that end. The tight constraints that Brokaw insisted upon hampered real debate and forced the candidates into a positions in which each was giving miniature stump speeches.

With regard to the comments by the angry man in the video, he absolutely hit the nail on the head. The socialist are trying to take over our country and Barack Obama has an agenda which will take us further to that end. Some time back I published a post on Obama's socialist connections. In it, I referenced Obama's association with and endorsement by the New Party (a socialist fusion group). It has recently come to light that Obama was actually a member of the NP and signed a contract promising to maintain a visible relationship with the group. The proof is a document which was scrubbed from the NP website but was archived by Web archive .org. This document lists Barack Obama as a member of the NP in Illinois.

To my knowledge, Obama has not, as yet, denied the charge, but make no mistake, he will deny it.