The farther I get through this description of Rep. Perriello’s latest town hall, the more I wonder why anybody would want the job. The angry and uninformed joined forces and shouted. #
News and meta-news about Charlottesville, VA, since 2001.
Sideblog
Police announced this afternoon that their investigation into what was initially believed to be a fatal fire on Rugby Avenue is now a homicide investigation. #
The Virginia Supreme Court has denied George Huguely’s appeal. His second-degree murder conviction will stand, WRIC reports. #
In a carefully worded story, and not citing specific sources, WTVR reports that forensic evidence belonging to Jesse Matthew Jr., the main suspect in the disappearance of Hannah Graham, matches forensic evidence collected during the investigation of Morgan Harrington’s 2009 murder. #
In the wake of Hannah Graham’s disappearance, and the evidence that came from private security footage, city officials are revisiting the question of installing security cameras on the downtown mall. #
Both Charlottesville Registrar Sheri Iachetta and former Electoral Board member Stephanie Commander have turned themselves in to the police on
foursix and four felony counts of embezzlement, respectively. #Ten years ago, the National Institutes of Health budget doubled and schools like the University of Virginia built massive new research facilities. A decade later, those buildings remain largely underutilized. NPR visits UVA in this story on the effect of federal binge and spurge spending in the sciences. #
In 2012, Council approved a new student housing complex on West Main—now some council members are questioning whether what they were shown matches what was built. #
The Architectural Review Board has approved a bike-themed mural on West Market, below the McGuffey Art Center, although at least one member expressed concerns that it might look like the bicyclists were riding away from Charlottesville’s downtown. #
City Police Chief Tim Longo is meeting with city leaders to work on protocols regarding the use of military surplus police weapons in Charlottesville. #
A 100-year-old Colonnades resident received military honors for her service in the WWII Women’s Army Corps #
-
Archive for Sideblog »
Perhaps people are angry because they ARE informed. Too many people do not care about their government, or what legislation is passed, or they only care after the fact and by then it is too late.
Also, by accounts from other attendees, there have been union members joining together that support the health care bill that come from other districts that are attending the town hall meetings.
Adam, I have to say that your post demonstrates exactly the kind of thinking that I find so depressing and disturbing about this health care debate (among other issues). You pass along an unsubstantiated rumor that “union members” (which I guess is supposed to sound scary enough on its own — coming from a long line of unionized blue-collar workers who depended on their unions to keep the company they worked for from screwing them over repeatedly) are “joining together” and attending town hall meetings. You have no proof, and I’ll wager you’ve not demanded proof from anyone who has told you this is happening. You probably heard it said in a confident, authoritative tone of voice from someone that you know and agree with politically to begin with, and it’s the kind of rumor that fits in nicely with all the other unsubstantiated allegations and conspiracy theories flying around these days, so why would you demand evidence? It sounds good to you. So you pass it along in every new forum that you enter.
And this seems to the m.o. of everyone opposed to doing anything to improve the morass that health care in America has become: “I heard that Obama just wants to destroy the whole system so he can nationalize health care.” “I heard that Obama wants to execute old people.” “I heard that when government takes over health care they’re going to be allowed to take money directly out of our bank accounts.” No evidence, no research, and no sense that doing one’s own research is even necessary: just taking the word of people on the Internet and the radio.
And how do you figure people “ARE informed” when they’re saying things like “I don’t want to have to pay for someone else’s health insurance” WHEN THAT’S ALREADY WHAT IS HAPPENING THROUGH INSURANCE COMPANY PREMIUMS or “I don’t want to see us start rationing health care” WHEN THAT IS ALREADY WHAT INSURANCE COMPANIES DO? How do you all someone “informed” when they don’t seem to be informed about the current system?
Cecil, you are absolutely correct. It is depressing to see people displaying their ignorance, accepting something they heard on talk radio or from a partisan political source opposing Obama as the gospel truth.
But then who said the “Big Lie Technique” didnt work?
I only wish Obama and his supporters were more passionate. I love to imagine how Harry S Truman would have responded to the Limbaughs and the Fox News crowd.
The idiots who have high-jacked the health care debate have managed to depress me far more than eight years of Bush ever did, and that’s saying something. Maybe it’s because I stupidly thought that people had finally awakened in this country, and were no longer going to act like sheep, believing everything they heard on Fox News.
Why are the residents of countries like Canada, the UK, Australia, France, etc looking at us and just scratching their heads in befuddlement. Why don’t people in this supposedly educated country get it?
What’s ethical about being uninsurable because you beat cancer 5 years ago? What’s civilized about someone, who paid taxes their entire life, having to shell out half their income for meds every month? What’s noble about losing your home due to the hospital bills the insurance company didn’t cover? And that’s if you can even afford insurance in the first place.
What is this sick delusion held by some Americans that makes them think the current health care system is even remotely tolerable or fair? I’m forced to agree with the following that appeared in the Independent. Many Americans are just freakin’ mean.
http://tiny.cc/9yzK9
I watch how the government handled Katrina, and I watch the mess they made of the “Cash for Clunkers” and all I can think of is…do I want them in charge of my health care? That would be a big no.
I like a version of the Japanese system and what the whole Foods guy advocates. The current system is not the answer, but no way is the government the answer. Ask anyone coming out of the Social Security office or who lived in NO in 2005.
There is a big difference between the starry eyed gaze upon Obamas rhetoric and the GS4 beaurocrat you will actually have to deal with…
Danpri, what “GS4 bureaucrat you will actually have to deal with”? Under none of the proposed plans is anybody obliged to deal with a government bureaucrat. If you like you for-profit health insurance, you can keep it.
I can’t imagine, not for one red hot second, that the
GS4 or whatever level federal employee I have to deal with can possibly be more incompetent, uncaring, and disinterested than any of the insurance company “phone answerers” I’ve dealt with recently. It’s just not conceivable that the government could do any worse.
Anybody who doesn’t think they have bureaucrats between them and their health care today either has never had to deal with their insirance company or has never been sick or injured.
Why, as a taxpaying American for most of my life, do I have to live in terror that I’ll fall ill in my own damned country? If it should happen to me in many other countries around the world, I’d be taken care of by competent doctors, and wouldn’t be bankrupted.
None of my Canadian or European friends have to worry about this, and in direct contrast to the bull**** coming from the right-wing, they all feel that the service they get is solid. They all pay their taxes, and everyone is treated equally under the law. Nobody has to wait until that weird pain turns into inoperable cancer, because they receive excellent preventative medicine. This is how civilized nations take care of their citizens.
What’s next? Maybe we’ll all have to start individually purchasing crime protection from the police like we do health protection? There are certainly many parallels that could be drawn between the two.
Adam and Cecil:
I had given up on this blog site, but glanced back and have to respond to this exchange. My wife was at the meeting last Thursday, and did indeed speak. Thanks Waldo for your kind words about those who expressed an opinion….
She was there before it started and waited in line for two hours to speak. She noticed a large group of individuals come in together (she estimated 20), all wearing red shirts in favor of this health care plan. They dispersed throughout he audience, and then left together. Many of them held some professionally made signs in favor of the health care that said AFL-CIO at the bottom.
A friend of hers was also there who spoke. He went up to several of these individuals and chatted. He asked where they were from, and one said Dayton Ohio, one said Florida and another said Philadelphia.
Were these individuals bused in at the union’s expense? Who knows? Now, I have not discussed this with anyone else, and I have no idea who Adam is, but needless to say, this was not lost on a number of attendees.
So Cecil, when I hear crap from people like you that discount what others have to say, I have to conclude you are the one passing off mis-information. Your comments about what people are saying about health care have NOTHING to do with what most people are concerned with. Sure, I do not doubt some say those goofy things, but there is some pretty silly things said by people in favor of a Government run health insurance program as well.
As for me, I can sum it up simply in that we don’t have the money to expand Government run programs, period. We have an out of control National Debt that started anew when the Republicans were in full control, escalated worse when we had a Republican President and Democratic Congress, and now is beyond limits. But we cannot afford what has already been promised, let alone take on several new Government run initiatives.
Randy, tell me one piece of misinformation I passed along in my post.
I just dont believe that once the government gets a hold of health insurance they will stop where they say they will. It will just be the first step. Just my personal feeling.
The Cash for clunkers was a mess. How can anyone say they will do better with so much more money and people. Heck, i wish they would let me keep my retirement money for myself to invest. Sure does not look like they are dong a very good job making it grow….
If there isn’t a publicly funded option, this entire exercise was simple masturbation. 10%, 11%, 12% of what a doctor charges covers the cost of… administering their records properly for health insurance companies. Have you looked at a receipt from a doctor recently: it isn’t aimed at you, the patient, at all: it’s aimed entirely at the wide variety of insurance companies the doctor has to accommodate. OOOOOOOOOOOO—-the government is so bad and will invade my privacy and screw up my health care…. HA! Like private companies haven’t already compromised your privacy and screwed up your health care already. Get a grip. Health insurance is and for a long time has been a huge rift between the haves and have-nots. Lose your job, quit your job… Lose your health insurance. What a wonderful land of Russian Roulette we live in. Also, gotta love the insurance companies thrilled to take your premiums month after month, year after year, until you actually need the insurance… then the company finally reviews the initial declaration you made to them about previous surgeries, conditions, medications, etc & discovers that you
FORGOT TO MENTION THE HANGNAIL YOU HAD IN 1963 AND DENIES ALL CLAIMS: YOU LYING SON-OF-A-GUN!
Yeah. Love the private insurance. Love being tied to a job because it provides it. Very, very freeing. Thank heavens the government isn’t involved!
Did anyone ask Tom or the out of state union flunkies who attended the meeting about
what will the Canadians do when they can’t come
across the border to get healthcare delivered in a reasonable time frame?
Detroit Free Press:
http://www.freep.com/article/20090820/BUSINESS06/908200420/1322/Canadians-visit-U.S.-to-get-health-care
When the Republicans were in charge they claimed the Democrats bused in dissenters. Now the Democrats are in charge and claim the Republicans are busing in dissenters. Is it possible the real majority of people in this country doesn’t trust or support EITHER one of the parties.
Sorry for the depression. Hopefully it will only be a passing psychological problem for the intelligencia rather than a financial problem for the entire country.
“As for me, I can sum it up simply in that we don’t have the money to expand Government run programs, period. We have an out of control National Debt that started anew when the Republicans were in full control, escalated worse when we had a Republican President and Democratic Congress, and now is beyond limits. But we cannot afford what has already been promised, let alone take on several new Government run initiatives.”
Please take a look here for the truth about Congress and the annual budget deficits:
http://i223.photobucket.com/albums/dd48/adamjeeps/Politics/National-Debt-GDP-L-1.gif
http://i223.photobucket.com/albums/dd48/adamjeeps/Politics/TheTruthAboutDeficits.png
http://i223.photobucket.com/albums/dd48/adamjeeps/Politics/USBudgetBalanceasofGDP1.jpg
It clearly shows that is doesn’t matter who is President, Congress prepares the annual budgets and the Republicans have a MUCH better track record of lowering the deficit.
Danpri writes, “I just dont believe that once the government gets a hold of health insurance they will stop where they say they will. It will just be the first step. Just my personal feeling.”
Translation: “I have no evidence to support this claim I’m making about ‘government’s’ nefarious real intentions regarding health care. I’m calling them/Obama liars even though I can’t point to a single tangible thing that functions as proof that what I predict will happen really will happen. I can’t show you anything that has happened up to this point that substantiates my claim that Barack Obama and his liberal minions crave as their ultimate goal the nationalization of health care. I can’t even put together a compelling rationale to explain why they would even want such a thing! I call it ‘just my personal feeling’ when what it really consists of is a regurgitation of every paranoid conspiracy theory I’ve ever heard on talk radio. I don’t even see the problem in forwarding such an incendiary hypothesis on the slimmest of pretexts–it’s what all my friends do, isn’t it? I like to call things ‘just my personal feeling’ because it has such a nice, populist sound to it: unlike those elitist eggheads who demand evidence, I go with my gut! If it was good enough for Bush, it’s good enough for me!”
Sorry, but I’ve never heard so many people essentially call the democratically elected leader of this country an outright, calculating liar as I’ve heard since Obama was elected. “I don’t like him because he’s going to raise my taxes.” Um, no, sir, his tax plan actually lowers your taxes, did you read his actual plan? “Well, maybe he says that now, but as soon as he gets elected, just you watch, he’s going to raise them.” Even though you have nothing to point to that proves he’s a liar or likely to lie? Even though you yourself would be outraged if people pegged you as a liar based on nothing you had ever done? I mean, what the f*ck more does the man have to do beyond saying “this is my plan, I wrote it down for everyone to read, this is what I want to do, not this, not that, but this, JUST READ IT FOR F*CK’S SAKE.”
“Well I don’t know, I just have this gut feeling he’s a liar.”
What. A. Bunch. Of. Crap.
Cecil, Obama does want to raise taxes on us all, allowing the Bush tax cuts to expire is, in fact, a tax increase:
http://www.cnsnews.com/public/content/article.aspx?RsrcID=43924
“I want to eliminate the Bush tax cuts,” Obama told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer in a May 2008 interview.
In fact, the lowest income tax bracket will increase from 10% to 15%, a 50% increase for those who make the least amount of money.
I have read the plans, and do not just listen to the rhetoric and propoganda from the liberal democrats that you claim you do not listen but do cite for your points of view.
Cecil:
You ask me to give an example of misinformation…
You attribute a statement that you may have heard from a few as coming from the majority. You said:
“…And this seems to the m.o. of everyone opposed to doing anything to improve the morass that health care in America has become: “I heard that Obama just wants to destroy the whole system so he can nationalize health care.” “I heard that Obama wants to execute old people.”…etc. etc.
Everyone at these meetings are not against health care reform, they are against what is currently being proposed! My wife started off her remarks by thanking Tom Perriello for holding this forum, and to work for a bi-partisan bill.
Health care costs could be brought down by some solid reform measures, but no, these proposals being pushed through are going way beyond that. But you and others dismiss these objections as misinformation, uninformed, Astroturf movement, idiots, and other derogatory terms.
You guys simply just don’t get it. Our Government is out of control!
Adam, good post
Thanks, fdr, for the link.
Remember: spending three trillion dollars to invade the wrong country and kill thousands of people is A-OK, but spending one trillion to save millions of Americans is “out of control.”
Or so I’ve gathered.
Hey let’s be fair, Waldo. We might get to a million deaths yet, so cut us some slack. :-)
The imbecility of the right-wing droids is beyond words.
The imbecility of the left-wing droids is beyond words.
See, that’s the thing: people leaning left are typically not droidal, and that’s their ultimate weakness: they can’t agree to unite. This is precisely why USA inc. has been going down the tubes, because it’s been trending neo-fascist right-wing for decades.
Regarding: …Remember: spending three trillion dollars to invade the wrong country and kill thousands of people is A-OK, but spending one trillion to save millions of Americans is “out of control.”…
Few comments:
1) I wonder where the $3 trillion figure comes from. We know from published sources the quoted cost is $686 billion, give or take, from inception to date. And this “Stiglitz – real cost projection” is $3 Trillion, but that is for both wars, and I believe through 2017. I wonder what his methods would estimate this “real cost” Government Nationalization of Health Care Program would cost over a 14 year period, but hey, what’s a few bucks among friends?
2) I will leave it to Hannity and Maher to argue the guns versus butter issues, but really, save millions? Save them?
3) I got depressed when the Republicans were in total control because of what I believed was out of control spending beyond tax receipts. Everyone should be held to the same standard of balancing budgets. Sure, in the first year or two of a war, or in a recession, you cannot balance the budget. But Bush and our Congress from both parties should have been forced to for a number of the years (more recently with a Democratic Congress, it’s their recession too you know).
Both parties have been spending out of control beyond our means.
Right now, we are thoroughly enjoying living off of credit issued by the Federal Reserve. When Europe and Asia become a little stronger and get tired of accepting our Reserve currency, it will be a blood coup. We won’t be able to buy Confderate currency with it.
See, that’s the thing: people far left are too often droidal. They’ve been trending neo-fascist left-wing for decades. See Cindy Sheehan – she’s important while Bush is in office, but her protests are ignored by the left when Obama is. Typical droid behavior
Is Cindy Sheehan still protesting?
Cindy Sheehan was completely ignored during the Bush Admin.
Fact: The USA was relentlessly engaged in Iraq during Bush.
Fact: The USA has been withdrawing from Iraq since the beginning of Obama’s Presidency.
But dearest “fdr”, I know you won’t let these facts – or any other for that matter – get in the way of your “feelings”. As any good droid, your dogmas will persist. And you’re proud of it.
No, Cindy was on the news and in the papers constantly – until now. Bush ignored her, but the press did not. Now she is truly ignored by Obama and the press.
Obama withdrawing from Iraq now is possibly premature, but only possible because of the “surge”.
Obama is undermining democracy in Hondurus, keeps Guantanomo open, and is spending money many times faster than anyone ever has. What is it you like about that?
I think these town hall meetings are over now. One thing for certain, they would have gone unnoticed if “angry” people hadn’t attended. In other words, I would rather have a bunch of angry people yelling at each other in the public forum rather than have nobody saying anything at all. Rembember “…liberty…death” wasn’t whispered.
I did hear today that Kristin Szakos was at the Perriello office managing who was getting into the health meeting and who wasn’t. If you didn’t have an appointment to be in the meeting (whatever that means) you didn’t get in and had to make an appointment for some other time. I wonder if she’s devoting any of her time dealing with local issues.
You must be right fdr. Cindy Sheehan, Iraq, Guantanamo, the Media, and everything else that’s wrong are all proof of Obama’s destructive legacy. What were we thinking when we got rid of Bush and his Klan?
Majunga, you missed the point. It’s that you are so partisan that the issues that were important to you last year, you just ignore now.
fdr – whatever it takes to pretend to be “right”, eh?