Hey Karol - looks like Brownshirt, thug, etc. are the tune of the day. It's inexact, cheap: hoping folks I respect refrain from even consciously-jokingly using any of that terminology, as it flies over the heads of pure reactionaries and immediately lowers the vibe of any discussion.

It is time for the GOP to take a stand and denounce these threats. There is a related post at http://iamsoannoyed.com/?page_id=588

Why do we allow the Republican Party for 8 miserable years to limit public access to Bush stump speechs by means of forcibly evicting anyone a) without a ticket from your local Republican Party or b) anyone voicing even the slightest inkling of dissent. I remember the days one could get arrested for wearing a pro-peace t-shirt within 5 blocks of the former President!

Where are the local police? I thought their job was maintain order.

I'm not a republican. I do denounce the tactics and approach of what I consider a lunatic fringe, a band of rabble being lead by the devious. This is no way to engage in important issues. I also admit to a certain cynical pleasure at first when learning that the left was getting a dose of tactics used by ELF, monkey wrenchers, MoveOn.org and some unions.

Carla, I'm certain that you too have decried these tactics when used by those on the left. Disrupting meetings just because your group 'can'; setting fire to buildings, breaking and entering, threats of violence and outright physical intimidation are no way to engage the other side and bring about understanding. They are no way to get your ideas or opposition across.

I posted similar sentiment on another item. Now is the time for cooler heads to prevail. Conversion of ideas does not come at the point of a bayonet.

I add this excellent link from the Oregonlive opinion pages. thankyou Senator Wyden and your group of bipartisan Senators working for aLL of us.

http://www.oregonlive.com/opinion/index.ssf/2009/08/healthy_americans_act_partisan.html

Folks, I have to say that we are indulging in pretend-shock at Diana's wan little finger-waving on voice mail. Hate to tell you this, true Hate Vitriol is typically way more out of control, bellicose. Granted, it's disturbing, but it's not really a high-reg on the Richter Scale of "violent threat".

I'm a fan of not being the same kind of asshole as "the other side", and at this point you/we/folks are at risk of behaving exactly as they did during the elections. The fingers are pointing both ways and just as easily could point all back at Selves and work out alright.

In some ways, calm might just show the miscreants as the tools they really want to be.

"Carla, I'm certain that you too have decried these tactics when used by those on the left. Disrupting meetings just because your group 'can'; setting fire to buildings, breaking and entering, threats of violence and outright physical intimidation are no way to engage the other side and bring about understanding."

Yeah, I for one do denounce those things...or I would if they were happening from the left. Do you know of instances where liberals actually disrupted any public appearances by Republicans to the point where they couldn't continue? Threatened or actually resorted to violence? One would think those would be widely reported, if they occurred.

One reason they might not have happened was because there was never any opportunity. Republican appearances, when they were in power, tended to be at pre-screened events. Usually the general public wasn't even invited, and if they were, any Democrats who attended were thrown out or even arrested before it even started, if they had a pro-Democrat T-shirt or if someone saw their bumper sticker.

One reason the Republican terrorists are able to get in is because the Democrats tend to welcome all people to their events, even those who might disagree with them.

"behaving as WE did" during the elections - viz loss of / lack of self-observation, and getting our jollies out of this drama. Eh?

Ah, the reeducation camp approach:

"If the local Republican Party and Greg Walden don't start denouncing this immediately--they're absolutely a party to this."

This is offensive when Republicans do it, even more offensive when Democrats cave in to Republicans doing it, and most offensive of all when Democrats adopt the tactic. It's an attempt not only to tie you up to guilt by association but also to control the terms of discussion by making people recite meaningless denunciations or else be slurred by hacks.

Shame. Very low class -- almost as bad as the perp photo parade for signature gatherers. I see that majority status is leading some Democrats to self-destructive hubris and adoption of the worst of Republican tactics, right on schedule.

This article - Bush's torture legacy haunts the US - is from Al-Jazeera. This abstract makes it germane to this topic:

"In substantive terms, however, the Obama administration is hewing a path far closer to its predecessor than most Americans realise. This reality could well frustrate Obama's attempts to cool down anti-American sentiments among potential Taliban and al-Qaeda sympathisers.

"It could also further weaken the fabric of the rule of law inside the US itself, (my emphasis) enshrining Bush-Cheney-era policies as the political and legal status quo even as the Justice Department and Congress begin investigations into potential criminal conduct at the highest levels of that administration."

Admiral, if you can't recognize MoveOn.orgs tactics or ELF/Greenpeace tactics here then there can be no meaningful converation. Too bad.

Scott in Damascus: "Why do we allow the Republican Party for 8 miserable years to limit public access to Bush stump speechs by means of forcibly evicting anyone a) without a ticket from your local Republican Party or b) anyone voicing even the slightest inkling of dissent. I remember the days one could get arrested for wearing a pro-peace t-shirt within 5 blocks of the former President!"

Progressives have completely forgotten how to use direct non-violent action as a tactic, that's why.

Progressives are now being schooled on how to use tactics conceived by Gandhi and brought to the USA by MLK as a tool of the wealthiest 1% to use their pawns to keep their money and power.

It's ridiculous how fat and lazy the left has gotten in this country. What's it going to take to get you to get off your ass and take some direct nonviolent economic action against these corrupt corporate overlords?

Start making the bottom line of the worst corporate offenders hurt. Get some boycotts started!

this isn't a threat. this just in.

This isn't a threat.

carla axtman "If the local Republican Party and Greg Walden don't start denouncing this immediately--they're absolutely a party to this.

They can't continue to allow this to go on any longer without standing up for what's right."

... or what, Carla?

If Walden and the local GOP don't denounce this, Democrats / Progressives are going to do to WHAT, Carla?

It's been so long since the left actually DID anything, what does the right have to fear? That we might blog them to death? The left has let blogging and the net take the place of everything we used to do. That's okay for some things, but blogging our outrage doesn't effect the physical world one bit. A blog can't cost a right winger a dime or a customer unless there's a call to a boycott or a strike of some kind back in the physical world.

We let the far right invade a foreign country with no justifiable cause, the left did nothing.

We let the far right torture anyone their paranoid delusions made them fear as a threat, the left did nothing.

We just let the investor class run up trillions of dollars of debt on our children and grandchildren credit cards, the left did nothing.

What is it going to take, Carla, to get the left off their butts and get out in the proverbial streets with their torches and pitchforks?

TJ: come on down offa that High Dudgeon high yer on, fella. First - VT is obviously a fake.

And - have you ever received a really truly honest to god THREAT-Threat? This ain't one.

It's a pissed off, tighter'n'a tick li'l lady parroting her hubby's utterances. But she ain't got a gun, and she's just as huffied up as folks in the game are getting to be.

It is getting laugable. Some folks are going to feel embarrassed once they come to their senses again.

:)

Frankly, TJ - I think parchment is above Ms. D's reach. Think rolled up newspaper. "Ya'll going to run into the Second...."

:)

"You should read the comments on my blog today from NRA supporters calling police "badge toting thugs."

Didn't GHW Bush renounce his membership in NRA because they supported armor-piercing bullets which could kill cops?

Adam, if anyone commits a violent act at one of these events, do you believe they should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law?

Or is violent protest OK if you agree with the protest?

This is something the anti-Vietnam war cause had to struggle with when some extremists started blowing up ROTC buildings. Yes, some of us are old enough to remember the debates over that--someone saying "they were only protesting the war" and others saying anyone convicted of a felony in such cases would just have to live with that, and if it derailed plans to become a lawyer or whatever, tough luck. "Don't do the crime if you can't do the time" and all that.

One good way to lose voters in the center is to advocate or condone violence. Political violence is wrong and those who practice it or do not speak out against it have lost my vote forever. Period. End of discussion. Enough people take that attitude and all the violence gets you is people on trial and lost political support.

My wife asked if i was going to chime in but its more fun to sit on the side and lets the cats pointlessly fight it out in the pillowcase than stick your hand in give a shit!

An interesting read:

San Francisco Chronicle Andrew S. Ross August 07, 2009 August offensive 2: Got a blast email Thursday from Organizing for America, a Democratic National Committee operation, which uses www.barackobama.com as one of its Web addresses. It accuses "insurance companies," along with "special interests, and partisan attack organizations" of "spreading smears about the president's plan for reform, trying to incite constituents into lashing out at their representatives and disrupting their events." Curious, I phoned the DNC in Washington and asked which insurance companies were engaging in such practices. A DNC spokesman cited the lobbying group, America's Health Insurance Plans, which I mentioned in my Thursday column. As proof, he referred me to two items from Washington Post blogger Greg Sargent. The first refers to AHIP encouraging its members to turn out at town hall meetings to "confront" Democratic lawmakers. But AHIP didn't employ that word. A Politico writer did, in a post linked to by Sargent. In the second post, Sargent informs us that AHIP is distributing "new talking points" to its members. As presented by Sargent, they focus on the organization's longstated opposition to the "government option" plan. Nothing smearing, inciting or disruptive hinted at. In fact, Sargent, no friend of the insurance industry judging by his posts, notes that AHIP "insists it doesn't want visitors to town halls to be disruptive." "There's nothing wrong with AHIP encouraging participation and distributing talking points," he adds. In which case, my question to the DNC (cc: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the White House): Who's smearing whom?

@ LT "Didn't GHW Bush renounce his membership in NRA because they supported armor-piercing bullets which could kill cops?"

<hr/>

Actually GHW Bush renounced his membership after LaPierre, the head of NRA called fed. ATF agents "jack-booted storm troopers" if memory serves.

Tonight from Rachael Maddow on MSNBC interviewing Frank Schaefer, former right wing Evangelical activist on the current escalation of violence from the right: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/8/7/763546/-Finally!-Someone-speaks-truth-to-power!

Rachel: Do you think that calling the President a "nazi"...calling the President "Hilter"...is an implicit call for politically motivated violence?

Schaeffer: Yes I do. In fact this rings a big bell with me because my dad who is a right wing evangelical leader wrote a book called "A Christian Manifesto"...and in that book he compared anybody who was pro-abortion to the nazi Germans; and he said that using violence or force to overthrow nazi Germany would have been appropriate for Christians including the assassination of Hitler....

The good news is is that it shows a desperation. The far right knows they've lost. They've lost the hearts and minds of most American people... But they also know that they have a large group of people who are not well-informed, who listen to their own sources, who buy the lies...and these people can be energized to go out and do really dreadful things and we've seen it in front of abortion clinics - I'm afraid we're going to see it with some of our political leaders. And the Glenn Becks of this world literally are responsible for unleashing what I regard as an anti-democratic, anti-american movement in this country that is trying to shut down legitimate debate and replace it with straight out intimidation."

Mr Chisholm,

I am disappointed in your journalistic integrity. You didn't even bother to fact check your story. You simply cut and paste from someone else's blog that is also incorrect.

From this story: TPM you cut and paste a Tweet that doesn't even exist. The second one, that advocates violence, does not exist and you could have checked it here: Scott's twitter

You also put up an edited video of your "proof" that the mobs were being violent, when in reality the entire video shows the SEIU member was arrested for assault. Here it is referenced: Washington Examiner and here's the full video for anyone interested in the truth (watch the SEIU member get arrested at the end of the video): youtube video

An attorney, you are not. This is not evidence AT ALL. This supposed telephone call was probably placed by a left wing, merlot sipping, Prius driver and then posted in an attempt to balance out the disgust of the SEIU kicking some ass at a town hall meeting. Come on folks, grow a half a brain.

Four Government Brown-shirts (aka SEIU Thugs) beat an innocent bystander and this call is 'violent'? You guys are pathetic. By the way, don't insult the protesters by calling them Republicans - they are worse than the democrats.

THIS IS SPIN!!!

Thursday night August 6, 2009, Representative Russ Carnahan had a town meeting. I know, because I got an invitation from barackobama.com. ... Organizing for America Mark --

I wanted to send you an urgent invitation to an important town hall with Rep. Russ Carnahan this evening, Thursday, August 6th. He'll be talking to constituents and gathering feedback -- this is an ideal opportunity to make sure your support for health insurance reform is seen and heard at exactly the right time.

Our congressional representatives are back home this month, and they're facing more and more pressure from special interests on health insurance reform. It's critical that we get out there and show them where we stand.

I hope you can join us.

What: Health Care Town Hall with Rep. Russ Carnahan

Where: Bernard Middle School 1054 Forder Road St. Louis, MO 63129

When: Thursday, August 6th 6:00 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.

RSVP ...

Well, it actually was an informational meeting about seniors and medical assistance. But the crowd swelled up from both sides about the looming Health Care bill. I got inside, and there were plenty of orchestrated applause sessions, and boos and jeers. But outside, hundreds could not get in. And out there is where the story starts. A black guy was selling Gadsen flags, with a white guy selling buttons. I witnessed a woman hassle the black guy, and call him a name for NOT being behind Obama. Then, later in the evening, THE INCIDENT happened. ...see first clip...and watch for the petite woman in the green shirt.

Obama's SEIU Thugs Attack a Black Conservative Outside Russ Carnahan Town Hall. [RAW VIDEO]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dqpfU_AC7Ls&feature=related

now..if you followed her, you saw her right there, in the center of it all, right from the first few seconds. Because this next clip, is hers, from her camera, as people react immediately after the attack. When an older female supporter joins in on the damage control, she tells Kelly, that she DID NOT see anything, and punches her camera, which slams against her head. And in the background, the white male SEIU guy from the attack is still fuming, and shouting obscenities, and intimidating people.

Pro Health Control Angry Mobs Attack People - Carnahan Town Hall 8/6/09 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yjzEPcp3r7U&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fuser%2FSTLC4L&feature=player_profilepage

Now, lets jump ahead, and in less than 24 hours SEIU is posting on youtube, that SEIU got attacked, and that all over the country they are dressed in Uncle Sam and Santa suits. But here, you can see strike breaker linemen in the familiar color of an SEIU member, and the first words you hear are a cover up. Except for the guy with the beard. He is still venomous to all, even the little woman with this camera, when she asks "who is the angry mob?"

Protect an American Tradition http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E08CjYFS8MU&feature=player_embedded

This is a professional set of clips, with SEIU logo all over it. This is unadulterated propoganda, and it exactly oposite the truth. The SEIU were arrested, two of them, and a third ran off on foot. So, I'm telling you again, that SEIU, is a rogue outfit, and cannot be trusted.

Once again the Republican right shows its true affinity toward violence. Back in the 90s they were the defender of the Christian Patriot Movement that spawned Timothy McVeigh, they were the defender of the anti-govt. white supremacist militias,and drew hate mongers like David Duke to run under their party sponsorship. They leave the Dem. party the opportunity to be the party of law and order with the rise of the new inciters to violence in the anti-govt. haters Glen Beck, Rush Limbaugh and their ilk.

Great comments, Bill R. Now I remember you are right about the "jackbooted thugs".

I had a conversation one time with an NRA supporter who is a genuinely nice person. I said, "you would be a better representative than LaPierre who drives lots of ordinary folks away" and he admitted LaPierre could get over the top sometimes.

And that is the point. Groups across the political spectrum sometimes forget that the "base" doesn't usually win anything except (sometimes) primaries. Someone poking someone else in the shoulder in an organizational election and saying "You are going to vote for me" can be enough to convince an undecided voter that maybe the other candidate isn't that bad after all. Disruption or violence can either cause disbelief (I can't believe he would do that) or turn otherwise undecided people away from a cause which contains violent members.

This is an old debate. JFK had "Civility is not a sign of weakness" in his Inaugural. Goldwater used to say "You catch more flies with honey than by hitting them over the head". I once saw a fascinating debate between Reagan and Wm. F. Buckley which was civil at all times. McCall could make a zinger remark against Reagan which sounded more witty than angry.

Those were all common sense adults aka "gentlemen of the old school". Much of the debate as described here and elsewhere sounds more like children, or the old line,"I know jr. high kids more mature than that".

I don't see any act of violence going unpunished in Oregon 2009--and what would the "tough on crime" crowd say about an act of violence by any of the people involved in these debates? That violence is against law and should be prosecuted? Or that violence is OK as long as their "side" is doing it?

Bill R. is right, "The good news is is that it shows a desperation. The far right knows they've lost. "

As a friend said decades ago, when they act like that, you know they know they are losing.

Yes there are uninformed people, but they all have friends. And if any of their friends say "political violence is always wrong and the Golden Rule says you should not do anything you would not want others to do to you", it is hard to believe they would say their friends were some kind of subversive for not agreeing to violence.

Or else, it ends friendships. Either way, I don't think it spells political victory for the disruptors or the violent. I've seen such behavior backfire way too often over the years.

The Republican tea-baggers are now faxing threats on the life of the president.This one sent to Rep. Brian Baird. Secret Service investigating:

http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/secret-service-looking-into-obama-joker-fax-2009-08-07.html

"If the local Republican Party and Greg Walden don't start denouncing this immediately--they're absolutely a party to this."

I think they already tried that when people were calling Bush an idot and Cheney Satan's disciple. Of course, those sort of brown-shirt Nazi-like (onley paraphrasing Brian Baird) tactics are OK.

UNLESS you disagree with the supreme being himself, Mr Obama.

"the current escalation of violence from the right"

Uh, they disagree and they raise their voice, like that has never happened from a Democrat.

You are making one very large leap friend unless you have some substantive proof (something a bit more than a Facebook page with 5 friends.)

Isn't funny how the SEIU members were the ones arrested for assault in St. Louis? Not we protesters. Also, we do carry and we know how to shoot straight; so watch who you pick a fight with. Cheers!

I watched the videotape of the incidence in St. Louis. It was clear to me that the SEIU casued this incident and used racist language (calling the man an "N"). I am an independent who is apalled at the bevavior of our President. Unless the democrats change their tune, I will be voting for anyone but a democrat!

Organizing strategies and tactics have no ideology. I was amused to hear the organizing director of FreedomWorks give props to Saul Alinsky in an interview during the Tax Day T-Bag action. Alinky gets vilified by the right for being a "socialist" but groups like Operation Rescue have used his trainings for decades.

Alinsky had a maxim, "the action is in the reaction". In other words you provoke the other side into confrontation. Obviously yelling at members of congress doesn't, in itself, produce any results, they just stand their for forty-five minutes and take it, and then go out for drinks. But if you can get you opposition to send in their troops, voila, you have the recipe for escalated confrontation. To the degree that the dynamic becomes a question of who can turnout better, the t-baggers have won, because this will create more opportunities for confrontation.

The difference between the t-baggers and, say, Code Pink or Operation Rescue is that CP and OR conduct a lot of training before their actions. The t-bagger organizers, not so much that I've observed. I do see a lot of passion there, and combined with strategies of multiple mass actions aimed at escalating confrontation, this is creating a very volatile dynamic. It would not surprise me if these confrontations become increasingly violent on both sides.

Absolutely disgusting and incredible what the SEIU did to Ken Gladney. Hopefully they get locked up for a very long time. Hopefully we can kill this health care monstrocity bill before it kills us.

I'm going to quote Hillary Clinton: "We are Americans, and we have a right to debate and disagree!"

Oh wait. I guess that only applies when a Republican is in the White House. When the Democrats are in control we are just supposed to shut up and drink the Kool-Aid. After all, disagreeing is racist. Or maybe it's because we are shills for the insurance companies. OR because if we were all as enlightened and smart as you, of course we would shut up and accept this Pablum. Or because Conservative free-speech corrupts, but Liberal free-speech is A-OK.

I read this thread until my hypocrisy meter pegged the full level. There is nothing funnier than watching the left-wind hoisted on their own petard.

Free speech works both ways. Deal with it.

I missed an edit. That is "Left Wing hoisted on their own petard."

Let's track Diana. Let's work this. Any takers? Any guesses?

Oh, and all you trolls. This is for you:

Diana and her knuckle -draggers think she can intimidate us? F her. Pick your weapon.

I don't get it. Angry, stupid, repulsive people act angry, stupid, and repulsive, and this is supposed to attract normal people to accept their point of view? Is this not lunacy?

Actual treats must be taken seriously, and town hall meetings should have adequate security, but as much as possible these losers should be ignored. They are like North Korea, shooting off fireworks pathetically trying to gain attention, while the rest of the world yawns "what else is new".

Oh, please. Is this their response to SEIU brown shirts beating a black man at Carnahan's town hall meeting? The thugs were caught on tape and arrested. Perhaps a RICO investigation into the SEIU is overdue considering how much money they poured into the Thug-in-Chief's campaign coffers?

"I don't get it. Angry, stupid, repulsive people act angry, stupid, and repulsive, and this is supposed to attract normal people to accept their point of view? Is this not lunacy?"

The strategy of the t-baggers is designed to polarize and agitate emotions, they're not trying to persuade people.

looks to me like the SEIU thug was the one doing the assaulting,.....maybe you folks should watch the video.

THE ANTI OBAMA MOB?? TO BEHAVE OURSELVES????WHAT THE HELL IS THIS. WE DISAGREE WITH WHAT THE MESIAH IS TRYING TO DO TO OUR HEALTHCARE & THIS COUNTRY & ALL OF A SUDDEN IT IS ANTI OBAMA AND WE ARE A MOB???? KISS MY xxx, OUR FOREFATHERS FOUGHT FOR THIS COUNTRY & SO WILL WE. WE ARE NOT GOING TO STAND BY & WATCH THE OBAMA THUGGERY DESTROY THIS GREAT NATION. HE CAN GO BACK TO KENYA, THAT COUNTRY IS ALREADY xxxxxx UP. KEEP UP THE PRESSURE GUYS, THE ADMIN IS GETTING SCARED!!!

Are we to think you blues can't imagine anything concerning about the proposed health care reform? If it weren't for the irrational opposition it would be a done deal?

This is why yo're having problems.

You can't answer or explain even the most basic framework of this ataempt of a massive government expansion.

How will it be paid for and not become another imminent fiscal calamity? How will it not lead to rationing? Will illegal aliens be covered or not? How will private insurance survive?

No you just want everyone to shut up and get this passed.

Just like cap and trade your other aggressive push.

Two observations, one specific, one general:

Specific: The SEIU assault and battery case is so far ALLEGED.

General: Why is it so many non-progressives in here use pseudonyms instead of their full names? Fear? I notice the majority of progressives here use their full names, and even after the years of problems I incurred with an online stalker who took it into real-time, when it comes to expressing my political opinions I rightly or wrongly still believe in not hiding when I express my political thoughts.

Martin,

General - I think your observations are correct for BO posters, but I notice that on conservative blogs it is most often the progressive who use the pseudonym. Maybe fear, but most likely just human nature to be hesitant in identifying one's self when different in thought than the majority.

I have to admit the implied threats from both sides on this particular thread are worse than usual, highlighting further how divisive this proposed health care legislation might become.

I disagree however that this is a democrat vs republican issue (except for the elected politicians). Seems much more like fringe right vs extreme left, with all the moderates watching from the sidelines.

Carla and Kari are the primary face of Blue Oegon, and cannot seem to handle any truth that is contrary to their goals. They will not read or look at anything that detracts from their story line.

On the other hand there are many who post here who seem to be able to look at all the info that is out there and come to the conclusion that there are fringe elements on all sides that make the entire situation look loony.

I am reminded of this quote made in the past few days:

Regarding the mobs of voters expressing their contempt and speaking out at congressional town hall meetings:

“No need for outrage, though. Instead, celebrate the fact that even with a Democratic president, a filibuster-proof Congress, and the lure of ‘free’ ice cream in the form of socialized medicine and cars-for-clunkers, the Democratic Party has somehow managed to turn ObamaCare into a clusterfark* of such epic proportions that their health-care message has now actually been reduced to ‘Don’t listen to the Republicans — they’re crazy.’”

• “fark” is a net and TV friendly replacement for the more foul f-word. It’s etymology is from the TV series Battlestar Gallactica

PS useful political dialog has disappeared

Steve "I don't get it. Angry, stupid, repulsive people act angry, stupid, and repulsive, and this is supposed to attract normal people to accept their point of view? Is this not lunacy?"

Lunacy? Quit fooling yourself, Steve. The far right doesn't care what their fellow citizens think of them. They care about power and money.

The far right has gotten almost all the money, and still seem to be exerting most of the power of the Legislative and Executive Branches of the US Fed. Gov't acting angry, stupid, and repulsive. The left has refused to put any obstacles whatsoever in the way of the far right. The right has figured out using corruption and general nastiness to steal and bully their way to doing anything they want and stealing anything not bolted down.

How will it be paid for and not become another imminent fiscal calamity?

That's what's being worked out in the various versions of plans in congress. So far there isn't a definitive answer, unless the answer is ideological. Someone posted that critics of the administration should take delight that the Dems are displaying a diversity of positions on health care reform as if this means that Dems are weak. What it shows is that the Dems have a big tent and that the Republicans have painted themselves into a corner that's getting smaller by the day.

How will it not lead to rationing?

Care is rationed now based on ability to pay. The conservative position that everyone has health care since everyone will be treated if they go to an emergency room acknowledges this. What I imagine will happen under an expanded public option is that it will work like Medicaid and Medicare, that care won't be explicitly rationed but will be limited by factors of the market; like the ability of patients to find doctors who accept the public option coverage.

Will illegal aliens be covered or not?

They aren't covered under Medicaid so I don't see why they'd be covered under an expanded public option. And of course, as long as they can get to an emergency room they'll get treatment just as they do now, and if they cannot or will not pay we'll pay in higher costs.

How will private insurance survive?

How indeed. Under the Republican White House and Congress health care costs to consumers doubled over the last ten years. Without reform there is no pressure on the insurance companies to control costs to consumers because consumers have few choices. These high costs are suck money away from productive use in the economy and make us less competitive. Frankly, with medical expenses the leading cause of bankruptcy in the US, I have to answer your question with another: Why defend an industry as inefficient as insurance?

"The strategy of the t-baggers is designed to polarize and agitate emotions, they're not trying to persuade people."

You sure you don't mean BlueOregon? There are basically about 3:1 articles of what idiots Rs are for opposing Obama's plan. Of the remainder posts, most are about how terrible medical care is now.

Then you get about 0.0001% that actually kinda maybe cover something in the actual Obama plan which even most congressmen don't now anything about because they'd better vote yes, because Obama/Emanuel/PlasticNancy remember names.

Carla stated - There aren't lefties showing up to town halls and shouting people down. They aren't inciting violence. They aren't putting people in situations where they feel threatened or that harm could come to them. That's the right...all by itself.

Kurt Observes - Apparently according to some reports coming in the SEIU members initiated and caused the brutal attack on the person outside the Town Hall Meeting. If true, this would contradict the statement above. SEIU is affiliated with HCAN, Health Care for America Now!, a democrat organization. From the emerging reports intimidation and threats of violence are now in the domain of both extremist sides and despicable in both.

I know that poeple in politics are no stranger to hyperbole and exaggeration...but I am really unclear on this one little detail...

What exactly was the threat?

Was there a mention of violence from "Diana"?

And yet...the title of the thread was "violent threat."

All I heard was a woman asking for people to respect the First Amendment...and mentioning the Second Amendment, a time-honored historical recourse to oppressive governments. I know the instinct of good little liberals is to assume when anyone mentions the Second Amendment is to immediately paint the comments as extreme and violent and abhorent. But really, is it a threat to talk about any part of the Constitution? You folks are looking for any possible opportunity and it's pathetic. This is even worse than Carla's perp-walk of petition signature gatherers. You folks should try sticking up for all the Constitution instead of just cherry-picking the amendments that meet your politically correct moral relativist standards.

Here’s the problem: right-wing talk radio (because as conservatives incessantly tell us, it’s the most popular) has so warped and mutilated rational discourse in America that political debate is now the equivalent of profession wrestling.

There’s no interest is truth telling or finding some kind of solution to a problem -- after all a solution might mean the problem would go away, and that would be bad for ratings. Rather, the point of talk-radio fueling these mobs (and yes, they’re acting just like a mob) is that rousing the rabble with inane threats and simple invectives is more profitable than a search for truth or an even-handed discussion of issues. Therefore, the loudest and crudest voices win. The vile speech from the likes of Larson, Savage, Hannity Beck, Taft, Limbaugh, etc, is simply more profitable.

We pay a deep price when we allow political debate to become merely one more entertainment commodity to be bought and sold like Fritos, and the result is what you see in these town meetings.

Um, you do understand that the St. Louis incident you mention was where three SEIU were arrested for assaulting a black vender of 'Don't Tread on Me' flags who expresses no opinion at all about the plan, but was out of work and trying to pick up money selling trinkets to the crowd?

You might want to point out which side is doing the violence instead of implying it is the senior citizen protester of half a trillion in cuts to medicare. Did you note that when the president said 'we are not cutting medicaid' he said NOTHING about medicare? And when you go back to his speech a couple of weeks ago, when his polls dropped, he said very clearly that the costs of covering tens of millions more people would be 2/3 paid for by 'savings' from medicare, savings which even the CBO doesn't see. If there will be no rationing, we deserve details on exactly how cuts to already insolvent medicare funding won't cut care to the elderly who paid into the insurance all their working lives.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PtDRx3h8JJA

"you're going to offer some proof that those tweets never existed. You do understand that tweets can be deleted, right? That they don't exist anymore is not proof that they didn't exist at first."

Seriously? Do you really believe that to be a compelling point?

Seriously now.

Murphy,

You forgot about Mike Malloy, Thom Hartmann, Randi Rhodes, Rachel Maddow, Ron Reagan, Bill Press, Ed Schultz, Alan Colmes, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

They also have a point of view on all this.

Alas, there aren't enough listeners in their audience to interest advertisers, so their radio shows aren't as widely heard across the nation. While heard in good old PDX, the rest of the nation is not so fortunate.

Funny thing about the "I'm a poor victim" spin on this situation paid political operative for Wyden and other industry-friendly pols Kari are now cranking up. This health care debate has come to this stage precisely because of corporate Democrats, led by Wyden, Kari's boss, have completely derailed the health care debate. The very same corporate and power interests funding and stoking the right wing crazies who also own the Democrats including Wyden who have slowed and blocked Congressional action.

Buy a clue people. You want real health care reform? Get out there and make 1-1 human connections with the large percentage of people going to these meetings who really are just tragically fearful, easily misled individuals who been whipped into a fearful frenzy by the corporate health care and health insurance industry. And have some spine and just outshout that small number of true crazies and genuine operatives who can't be reached.

That's what politics and the 1st Amendment is about, and what those now trying to whip up a mighty "get out there and whine" counteroffensive being launched by the sold-out wing of the Democratic Party don't want you to do. Wyden, Conrad, Baucus, Nelson, and the rest of the corporate tools in the Democratic Party would like nothing better than for most of you pathetic wimps who fancy yourself to be the center of the universe to be the opinion leaders of a masturbatory whinefest. This allows them to themselves as the calm, "civil", above-it-all, "leaders" who just have to step in for the good of the country, pointing to what happened over the recess, and ram through their corporate welfare health care reform plans that will mandate that you to buy health insurance from private insurance companies (the real goal behind all this).

Don't be played for a fool by either face the corporate health insurance industry cynically bought and paid for in their strategy to reach just enough different segments of the public to insure they block this reform. Want to do one positive thing: Get on the phone to Wyden's office and tell him that recent events now require that he publicly renounce his plan, reject the "gang-of-six" and the Finance Committee plan, get out on board and out front as an advocate for getting the private health insurance industry out of our health care system and publicly pressure fellow Democrats to do the same thing.

And while you're at it call your representatives and the WH and tell them Rahm Emanuel has to go for his latest little contribution to this in berating our activist groups for exposing and criticizing precisely that wing of the Democratic Party these corporate criminals have mobilized along side the right wing crazies they have mobilized to get out there to jam the town hall meetings by the our representatives of the true Democratic wing of the Democratic Party.

Carla, I've got a deal for you.

If the SEIU guys are being spinned by the right and end up innocent, I'll say so.

If the Vendor is being spinned and the SEIU guys did attack him, then you'll say so?

Either way, political discourse lost in st Louis Thursday evening.

There are extremists on all sides, from the current crowd disrupting town hall meetings to the folk showing up at town hall meetings after Democrats took control in the 2006 election and demanding the troops come home from Iraq immediately. I was especially offended by the Nadershouters of 2000 who seemed to think drowning out Tipper Gore at an outdoor speech in Salem ("ya got a problem with free speech lady?" was the response if someone moved to an area away from one of the shourters) would guaranted Nader a place in debates.

Republicans at that event, btw, were smart---silently held up signs but did not disrupt the event by shouting.

In the end, folks, it is the swing voters, the folks who live their lives without a lot of political involvement but discuss things with friends, who are the biggest force in the electorate and in public opinion. Does this stuff impress them?

I was having an email discussion about current events with a friend. I mentioned a news story about a woman who had organized the teabagger 4th of July anti-tax event talking about a local congressional town hall meeting. She claimed "the majority of people in our 25th district agree we don't want socialized medicine" and therefore showing up and being vocal (even to the point of yelling at a member of Congress that there was only their point of view, no other point of view was valid) was justified.

An ordinary citizen has no way of knowing what the "majority" in a Democratic district believes other than that a majority of voters chose a Democratic member of Congress last November. My favorite history prof. spoke of people like this when he said, "any time a public figure says 'the American people', substitute 'people like us' and you will have their true meaning. So, was this woman claiming to "know" most voters agreed with her, did she have access to polls, or was she saying anyone disagreeing with her didn't matter?

Just now I got a return email from this friend who is truly a swing voter--how else to describe someone I know voted for John Kitzhaber, Gordon Smith, GW Bush, and Darlene Hooley?

Here is his response:

"Sure. I totally agree with your "blessed are the peacemakers" approach to life. Yelling insults and violating rules of a town hall meeting is not consistent or effective in getting some action in an upsetting situation. She will get the appropriate response: no effect."

Steve, sometimes I get annoyed by BO, but that doesn't mean it reflects politics at large. I still have a bumper sticker on my car because there were people during last year's primary who called me names because I didn't back their primary candidate.

But that doesn't change the fact that threats don't work in politics if one has a positive agenda. The candidate whose bumper sticker is still on my car won my county solidly--so even if this one voter had said "OK, quit nagging me, I will support your candidate" (not likely for an independent thinker like me), that wouldn't have changed the outcome. All the stuff about Mult. Co. being the only county that mattered only mattered in the amount of total vote--the other candidate won Mult. but only a couple other counties and lost statewide.

OK Steve, a challenge for you. What health care proposal do you have?

Current system works just fine? Everyone should buy health care insurance even if that doesn't leave enough left over for food and rent? Tough luck you have a pre-existing condition but any change to the current system will challenge capitalism as we know it? Time to end fee for service medicine and come up with a new model--like Cleveland Clinic or other institutions? *Every Republican amendment debated in a committee (House or Senate) should have been agreed to?

Do you agree with what Dr. Bates, Dr. Kitzhaber, Dr. Dean, Dr. Frist, Dr. Coburn, or any other doctor in public life has said on this issue?

Or are you just another enemy-oriented commentator who knows what you are against but can't state a positive agenda?

This debate and the fractious town hall events are like a couple of dogs fighting over a bone on a railroad track. It is tempting to hope a train will come along and put them out of their misery, but the problem is they are more likely to cause a train wreck. Both sides - Republicans and Democrats - tend to be full of crap.

On the Republican-Libertarian side, among other idiocies, they are calling the health care plans circulating in Congress after they were written with great input from insurance corporations "socialism."

On the Democratic side they are claiming these plans are to help the people. See Obama's $80 Billion Deal with Pharma Is a Very Bad Deal for Us for one example of stacking the deck for the medical-insurance-pharmaceutical complex.

Not surprisingly, both sides are heavily populated with ideologues who spout stock talking points. If someone makes a statement that is later proved to be hogwash, he or she will adopt a tactic that is common on Blue Oregon. Don't admit to being wrong - that means being honest. The name of the game is to "win." Move on and change the subject. Keep your blinkers on. You'll never get a resolution with that attitude - not that you really want one, do you?

The Republicans are highly negative towards Obama as the Democrats were hostile to George W. Bush, but Obama is following in the latter's footsteps in critical areas. See Why Does Barack Obama Follow the George W Bush Playbook?

Some Democrats opposed George Bush's war on Iraq, but they are okay with Obama's wars in Afghanistan and Pakistan despite the fact they are likely to prove as insane as Bush's Iraq folly and the Kennedy-Johnson-Nixon tragedy in Vietnam. The Republicans say we can't afford a trillion dollars over ten years for health care, but they have no problem with $2 to $3 trillion for Iraq and who knows how much for AfPak. Never mind the consequences that may occur beyond South Asia.

It looks like it is going to be a nice weekend in Oregon. Go out and enjoy one of the many scenic spots in the state and take a break from spouting your bullshit.

Mike M --

“You forgot about Mike Malloy, Thom Hartmann, Randi Rhodes, Rachel Maddow, Ron Reagan, Bill Press, Ed Schultz, Alan Colmes, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr.”

I would place Malloy and Rhodes on that list, but the others rarely, if ever, lower themselves into the sewer in which the conservatives I listed wallow daily. Do you really want to compare Hartmann to Savage, Beck and Limbaugh in civility and thoughtfulness?

But as you suggest, it’s a moot point. Freak-shows sell better than civil debates, and it’s the conservatives on radio who are responsible for the sad state of political discourse in American today, and who are also responsible for the ugly spectacle of these town-halls.

They made this bed, but unfortunately we are all forced to lie in it.

Roy:

Thanks. As for GOP vs Democrat issue regarding the health care debate, I'm biased for Democrats, being one myself. But, in reality I see this particular issue as corporatists vs average people, with 72% of the average people's wishes being ignored by Congress, including Democrats.

With a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate and a solid majority in the House, there should be nothing but single payer as the health care plan, no ifs, ands, or buts. THAT is what the overwhelming majority of American people demand. Instead, single payer is treated as a source of a plague by most congressfolk in my party, and I for one find that more than discouraging. If it's a leadership problem in Congress, then we need to fire our current leaders. If Reid can't get all 60 Democrats to grow a spine on this and put the people ahead of corporations, Reid needs to go as leader and a ramrod needs to be put in his place. Same for Pelosi. No compromises.

To quote Bill Maher's routine from last night, Growacet.

And if we absolutely must compromise, if that compromise does not include a wide-ranging public option, then I seriously question the leadership in my party if they choose to wimp out in favor of corporations against the overwhelming wishes of the American people.

That and the following may be extreme views, especially this: I do not see any moderate Republicans anymore. There seems to be nothing but extremists. True, not all Republicans act as these wigouts do in the town hall meetings, and a very few Republicans do manage to occasionally bother to get their facts and background straight before running off at the keyboard or mouth.

But by tacitly accepting violent extremists who operate visibly and vocally in their name; allowing hate-mongering media personalities to set the tone and direction for their party WITHOUT decrying such an odd circumstance; and for not standing up for civility by denouncing those in their party who use anger, violence, and threats of violence, there are no moderates. Decent Republicans should be running these teabaggers and wigouts out of their party without any prodding from us. That none even attempt to do so speaks volumes about the personalities of today's Republicans.

Democrats would in a heartbeat denounce party members who, in the name of the party, behaved in a similar fashion to these wigouts at the town hall meetings and did so while publicly proclaiming they are Democrats.

A friend on another website posted that progressives have several sources of information that provide details and background information, from Daily Kos to HuffPost and many more. However, Grand Old Fascist Party members seem to have a dearth of such websites on their side, and instead rely on radio or television personalities to tell them what to think, believe, and say. The only reading that takes place comes from GOFPers opening their emails and reading the talking points from those media personalities or other GOFP organizations who condense complex subject matter into simple, often incorrect soundbites that are easy to memorize.

I'm not calling Republicans nazis; but I am calling them fascists. Having read the works of Chris Hedges and the earlier tome by Sinclair Lewis, "It Can't Happen Here," I do not base this labeling on simply my opinion.

I'd love to be proven wrong by a Republican who can post in a civil manner and provide references and links to back up his/her counterpoint to what I've said. Somehow, though, I suspect the best I will get will be a slew of insults and opinions expressed as fact. We'll see...

Carla, I've got a deal for you.

If the SEIU guys are being spinned by the right and end up innocent, I'll say so.

If the Vendor is being spinned and the SEIU guys did attack him, then you'll say so?

Either way, political discourse lost in st Louis Thursday evening.

Kurt, I think the founders would find you to be a pathetic excuse for what is actually required of citizens in a representative Democracy.

Political discourse will only lose in this health care debate if people with a brain don't also find a spine to become the loudest voice, a voice of reason, in this debate. That's not disturbing the peace, or disorderly conduct, even if a bunch of cops who don't themselves have a fully developed respect for the First Amendment or the difference between legal speech and illegal action don't understand that.

People need to read a little history about town halls meetings (and constitutional conventions) in the Revolutionary era. There is a reason the First Amendment has no ifs, ands, or decibel limits in it:

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

It is precisely the extent to which these meetings are allowed to be emotional but honest VERBAL confrontations that our democracy works. It is precisely the extent to which power interests like the health care industry and government officials, with the willing support of those in the public who agree with whatever views those power interest represent, manipulate our laws, with the full knowledge that civil order breaks down when people are deprived of their right to be speak in whatever manner they want, that our representative democracy collapses.

We are just starting to see the necessary messiness in public debate that needs to be restored to our democracy after 30+ years of corporate rape of our democracy by parts of both major parties and parts of most minor parties. This event is a watershed in our political history and we need to look carefully at even those who take the same labels as ourselves as to their whether their real motives are what are best for all people, or just people who agree with them.

""The strategy of the t-baggers is designed to polarize and agitate emotions, they're not trying to persuade people."

You sure you don't mean BlueOregon?"

Or any other partisan blog aggregator regardless of affiliation. I was referring to the specific strategy of the t-baggers to confront congress members by disrupting town halls.

In the end, folks, it is the swing voters, the folks who live their lives without a lot of political involvement but discuss things with friends, who are the biggest force in the electorate and in public opinion. Does this stuff impress them?

Actually LT you couldn't be more ignorant because your world view is not nearly as informed as you so smugly believe. You are a prime example of the Oregon "activist" who is a legend only in his/her own mind.

Here's the cold hard mathematical truth that every successful politician, and particularly cynical NW politicians like Wyden who makes the "swing vote" game actually calculates:

Any politician on the "left side" of the spectrum who works to get the ~20% swing but loses the ~20% liberal vote, loses. Rahm Emanual is a perfect example of a guy who is going to lose the next election for Democrats for exactly this reason if he is not kicked out of the Administration.

Any politician on the "right side" of the spectrum who works to get the ~20% swing but loses the ~20% loony right vote, loses. Now the Spector has left the Republican Party, there are about two politically impotent Republicans (Snowe and Collins) left in the center who demonstrate the "success" of the "swing vote" argument.

And if all you do is base your strategy on the appealing to the clueless "swing" middle, you spend your working forty hours a week or more doing something else beside casting votes in the House or Senate.

That's pretty much the way our representative democracy is supposed to work because the mythical "swing vote" doesn't really care much about politics at all. They certainly don't pay enough attention to what is going on and, when they actually have to vote on contentious matters or in contentious races, vote "no" or "no vote".

Obama got elected not by appealing to the swing vote. He appealed to the party base. Well in his case he had good enough people skills that he managed to convince the party base he represented whatever they wanted a candidate to represented, and then it as that base that actually motivated the followers that are the "swing vote".

This health care debate is important because whoever shows they have power to control the debate will determine the public perception and win. And the "swing vote" will then just be relieved to know who to follow. And few swing voters find those who whine about their victimhood, or worse who look down their nose about "democracy losing" as controlling the debate. Or even being the kind of people for whom they have contempt.

Hey Blue Oregon. If you watch the video and read the St. Louis Papers it was the SEIU thug who assaulted a 150 lb. Black Man with violence and racial slurs. He and 3 of his racist thug friends were arrested. Anyone recognize them?

Funny how anti-globalization riots are proclaimed to be "mostly peaceful" but let ordinary citizens oppose the Obama administration and suddenly they're dangerous, "angry mobs" that threaten the fabric of decent society.

And it is truly pathetic that a union such as the SEIU would go to these townhall meetings, rough up their opponents in front of cameras (as is the custom of most union activists I have ever met) and then run to the media claiming they're the victims! Typical bullies.

Did those nasty protesters bruise your dainty knuckles with their faces! You poor things! Did mommy kiss it and make it better?

A friend on another website posted that progressives have several sources of information that provide details and background information, from Daily Kos to HuffPost and many more.

I'm not calling Republicans nazis; but I am calling them fascists. Having read the works of Chris Hedges and the earlier tome by Sinclair Lewis, "It Can't Happen Here," I do not base this labeling on simply my opinion.

if the first statement is a reflection of your view about the blogosphere (and HuffPo is probably the most outrageous example as they know tool up to make money for the people who put several tens of millions of VC into the HuffPo some months ago) It's at least clear that you don't quite grasp what Hedges said in his latest book: Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle.

I don't think he finds even the sources you cite as per se informative, or the radio talk shows on the right as any different. His point, and one your simplistic viewpoint demonstrates, is the death of genuine intellect and literacy that you demonstrate in the superficiality of your argument.

Just a quote from Hedges that I've heard in various forms in various interviews:

"It’s the story of an America that has transferred its allegiance to spectacle, to pseudo-events, that no longer can determine what is real and what is illusion, that confuses how they’re made to feel with knowledge, that confuses propaganda with ideology, and that’s exceedingly dangerous. All totalitarian societies are image-based societies, and that’s what our society has become."

I'm sorry but Daily Kos and HuffPo are all about the brand --- the image --- and content and debate and genuine intellectual analysis is always subjugated to the needs of the brand in those pages. Just like Blue Oregon.

"Why is it so many non-progressives in here use pseudonyms instead of their full names? Fear?"

Here's the difference between you so-called "progressives" (aka, brainwashed followers of flower power, nihilism, and communism) and us realists.

We hate your ideas, we don't hate you. We dislike your radio hosts but we don't pray that they kill themselves on air, like your hosts do.

We don't march through your towns with hundreds of thousands led by groups that support NK & Iran getting nukes, carrying coffins calling you and your leaders murderers, hitler, chimp.... etc. we don't disrupt your govt meetings running up to your politicians with fake blood on our hands and screaming at them. (not yet, anyway; wait until and if you get your way destroying our health care and our relatives start dying... fake blood will be the least of your problems).

We DO shout "READ THE BILL" because YOUR reps have BRAGGED how they don't read it.

And yes, we are afraid of you.

Based on your actions during the last 8 years, and based on your and your medias concerted effort to deceive America into thinking BHO was just some hot-talking, (TOTUS!) trendy, moderate who had no connection to the far left, bombing, scum like Ayers, or the race-hustling / white hating Rev Wright, based on all that, we think you are bat shit crazy and dangerous, so yes we are afraid.

Afraid you will continue in your efforts to "remake America" which we understand in your alinsky and marcuse talk means first destroying America.

We will fight you at the ballot box, and if you and your SEIU and ACORN thugs want it, we will fight you in the streets.

But we won't be inviting you to our homes.

Diana and her knuckle -draggers think she can intimidate us? F her. Pick your weapon. Posted by: ferris | Aug 7, 2009 11:00:03 PM

Uh, ferris, that's a threat.

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 —

Liberals are the true fascists and Obama is nothing but a neo-nazi thug. If you leftists thought you would be able to steal the country you probably would have been able to if you were more subtle. Patriots are awake now and you don't stand a chance. If this period escalates into true civil unrest you liberals do not stand a chance.

Jeff in Ohio: Those tweets have clearly been deleted. I can confirm that both of them did exist on that account when I checked them soon after the TPM story.

Don't be duped (a pseudonym from a Republican, I'm SHOCKED I tell you)

I'd love to be proven wrong by a Republican who can post in a civil manner and provide references and links to back up his/her counterpoint to what I've said. Somehow, though, I suspect the best I will get will be a slew of insults and opinions expressed as fact. We'll see...

I saw. The only sources I cited were Hedges and Sinclair Lewis; I doubt Hedges views himself or Lewis as incredible. Now, I did REFER to Daily Kos and HuffPost as examples, but I didn't cite them as references. You do know the difference, right?

Joe:

I just don't understand what you were trying to say. I was taught that when the audience doesn't understand what one is trying to communicate, the problem isn't the audience who doesn't understand, it's the fault of the communicator for not explaining it well enough. But that's just me; I have no idea what you were trying to communicate.

Glen Beck jokes about poisoning Pelosi.

I live in America and did a hitch in the Navy some 30 years ago. I don't want to destroy this country. But yes, I do want to remake it. America is broken in many ways.

Joe, can you tell us the number of the House resolution that is the proposed health care reform package, since you mention something about reading it, or can you tell us how many versions of the resolution exist as it's come through several committees so far.

I would ask for a verifiable reference to marches where "liberals and their media" urged that North Korea and Iran be allowed to develop nuclear weapons, but I know from experience such requests bear no fruit.

I'm not a christian, but I don't hate anyone or anything, except for maybe willful ignorance, but even then I believe the strongest I feel about that is detesting it. I don't understand people who have reasons for hating. To me, hating someone or something is akin to taking poison and expecting it to hurt the other guy.

In the past I've tried to post on Free Republic and a couple of other right-wing sites that are the opposite of Blue Oregon. However, my posts and the posts of other progressives get deleted almost immediately on those sites. For all the complaining I hear about Blue Oregon in here, I note that I can actually read those complaints, a privilege not allowed for opposing views on the opposite side.

Sorry, I don't normally feel so argumentative for it produces nothing but malice and ill-will. I do normally prefer constructive dialogue with give and take. I should know better than to post so strongly and expect different results.

So, I believe I will simply call it a day as I've seen only confirmation of my opinions about the lack of moderates in the GOP who are willing to actually engage in dialogue, rather than simply try to whimper about liberals destroying America, and confusing their opinions for factual statements about how things are. I realize my opinions are just that, my opinions.

Posted by: Carla Axtman | Aug 8, 2009 9:11:40 AM

What are you talking about, exactly? There are fringe elements on all sides of which situation? There aren't lefties showing up to town halls and shouting people down. They aren't inciting violence. They aren't putting people in situations where they feel threatened or that harm could come to them. That's the right...all by itself.

I want to know why lefties are being paid to show support for such a piece of garbage as this health care reform legislation...Yeah the left is sooo innocent...I would call an add like this inciteful...

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tickleddragon on August 6, 2009 at 9:23 PM

Now now, KC. No peace-making or sense allowed on a message board on a Saturday midday.

And I have the Kenyan birth certificate to prove I've got an American ass...

;>)

Posted by: Martin Burch | Aug 8, 2009 12:17:54 PM

Don't be duped (a pseudonym from a Republican, I'm SHOCKED I tell you) I'd love to be proven wrong by a Republican who can post in a civil manner and provide references and links to back up his/her counterpoint to what I've said. Somehow, though, I suspect the best I will get will be a slew of insults and opinions expressed as fact. We'll see... I saw. The only sources I cited were Hedges and Sinclair Lewis; I doubt Hedges views himself or Lewis as incredible. Now, I did REFER to Daily Kos and HuffPost as examples, but I didn't cite them as references. You do know the difference, right?\

Well as least you prove the point you are an example of the idiots on our side that are a big part of the problem.

Let's see, I'm a Democrat, but all you can do, in exactly the fashion Hedges bemoans is resort to a superficial spectacle of labelling. In this case whining somebody who points out how you apparently are too stupid to understand what you read, but have no problem referring to in defense of some stereotype you make about their brands versus our brands, has to be a Republican. In third grade are we?

Next, I have no idea what you are quoting, yourself? Not anything I wrote. So what point are you rebutting? Your own? Just how small is that pebble rattling around in that empty space between your ears? Anybody really wonder why the right wing gets a toe hold in the debate since people on our side have so little of substance to actually say, much less the ability to deal with their rationalizations based on string together half truths?

And I agree I doubt Hedges or Lewis fantasize they are members of the "The Incredibles", or that "incredible" is an adjective that describes anything I wrote about their views. And did I say you "referenced" them? What I wrote, including your own quotes, is that you clearly didn't understand what Hedges said. You do understand the "nuance" of what I wrote, didn't you?

<>I want to know why lefties are being paid to show support for such a piece of garbage as this health care reform legislation...Yeah the left is sooo innocent...I would call an add like this inciteful...

"Conservative_Guy" --- assuming you are for real and not just some guy pulling it to while some hours away on Saturday --- you're the kind of ignorant fool who we really should make sure isn't covered by health insurance. That way your genes will leave the gene pool for the benefit of us all (the authoritarian conservative mindset having been shown to a least correlate with a genetic origin).

It's pretty clear you don't have a clue what "inciteful" even means, and it's even more likely you couldn't explain the facts of any of the health care proposals being debated. Or even better, why some of us understand the corporate money behind the people who excite you so much, as well as the frauds in our own Democratic Party who gave us some of them.

Now when you have informed yourself enough about the facts of the bills on the table and the guts to shout it out over the facts of the bills, come back and give it a try, you little sniveling wimp.

I love this website:

Flame Warriors

When all else fails, conjure up FAKE THREATS.

Doesn't the race baiting they usually use work for for them any more? Or maybe poeple have seen through that.

Sorry--not believing this BIG FAT LIE!

I'll tell you what... When a single person on the "Pro" side of this debate cites a single item from any of the actual legislation being considered, then they have a legitemate comment. Until then, they're simply lying, because what's not in writing DOES NOT EXIST.

Now, in my blog ...

I have a wide array of actual ITEMS in the bill, compiled by someone who's taken the time to compile them. A lawyer, in fact, a legal professor, I'm told. Whatever the case, if you look for the list of things in Obamacare there, you can find a lot of stuff that's discusssed, and taken straight out of the legislation that's actually in the works. Mind you, I've read no more than 100 to 200 pages of it. It is stupefyingly dull and lawyerly. And, it is unbelievably complex with deeply nested interrelationships between elements and definitions and actions it specifies.

The president has made various statements about "preserving choice" and "keeping your doctor" and "bending curves", etc. But keep in mind that Obama submitted nothing to Congress. Obama, by his own word, has not read what's in any of the versions promoted. Every promise he makes, is like a child arguing "when my big brother's getting home, he's gonna beat you up!". Obama's making whatever arguments his focus groups have told him people want to hear and that's it.

There's no substance, no actual assurance ANY of it is true. The President is not controlling the Congressional process. Congress has its own agenda, and promises made by Obama are simply PR stunts. They're doing whatever the heck it is they feel like doing, not following HIS demands.

When people argue that this is the road to a government run system, it's because the legislation ( the general gist of all of the different versions ) creates that outcome. Obama himself is quoted on video proving he wants a single government payer system.

For those of you who are carrying the water for the plethora of rhetoric spewing out of the White House, you've been misled. You're arguing unreality. Your leader has abandoned you and is playing his own game of chicken on the highway of politics, and hoping to get out of the way in the last moment, and claim credit for whatever he thinks he can claim credit for.

To argue that what he is promising or stating, as if it were concrete, is to be on that highway with him, and no cover is available. It's just empty words and promises. What's coming is just as out of his control as it is yours. And the people who are crafting it have no record of success... AT ANYTHING.

If you want to come argue about the merits of these things, I even have a forum you can use just for that. I censor profanity, obscenity, racism, and anything deemed unfit for kids to read. But not disagreement.

Well,if that's all it take to make SEIU grunts wet their collective fag panties,I would have called them myself....what's their number?

Hey 'don't be duped', it is YOU who is defending the indefensible. Craigslist has been running ads, recruiting people for months, promising to pay them a little over mininum wage to be activists for the President's agendas. Not limited to health care, but to a huge array of items. These ads have been run in many states and localities and I took the time to try to find out who is paying people to create "grassroots" efforts.

Oddly enough, these people try real hard to obscure their funding sources and with whom they are affiliated. Well, not oddly at all. All the usual suspects are in play here. It's the same rent-a-mob types that have been paid to pretend to be grassroots leftist activists for many years. New names appear as the old ones get exposed, but they are so predictable and obvious, it's no longer worth the research.

There is no "right wing" rent-a-mob to be found. No ad exists in any publication anywhere to pay people to oppose what they believe is very bad stuff. Despite the lies from the White House, there is no paid mass protest from the Insurance Companies. They're the targets of this administration for complete destruction... Along with the hundreds of thousands of jobs they create.

Your apparent need to mock and belittle is evidence of your complete lack of substantive thought or message, and it is completely transparent to anyone with the intellectual might of a 5th grader or higher. Perhaps it's you who needs to reconsider your own warped lack of reality based thinking.

Former right wing organizer Frank Schaefer uses the F word to describe the tactics of Dick Army's lobbying firm Freedom Works in an article over at Truthout.org...

"...How Can the Right Stoop So Low?

I used to know Dick Armey quite well. One of my sons even worked for him as an intern. I knew Armey in the context of his being a fan of my late Evangelical Religious Right leader father Francis Schaeffer. (Back in the day when I was a right wing "pro-life" organizer who has long since quit the Republicans in disgust at their - our - descent into extremism and hate.) Armey was once a decent guy, whatever his political views. How could he stoop so low as to be organizing what amounts to America's Brown Shirts today?

I think I know what happened to him, Gingrich and the rest: They can't compute that their white man-led conservative revolution is dead. They can't reconcile their idea of themselves with the fact that white men like them don't run the country any more - and never will again. To them the black president is leading a column of the "other" into their promised land. Gays, immigrants, blacks, progressives, even a female Hispanic appointed to the Supreme Court... for them this is the Apocalypse.

The last presidential election (to paraphrase Bart Simpson) "broke their brains." What else could explain their embrace of intimidation - rather than discourse - over the health care debate and such unsavory moments of madness as the Republicans accusing Obama and Judge Sonia Sotomayor of racism, knowing full well that they'd just destroyed their chances with the Hispanic community forever?

The "Scorched Earth Policy"

Dick Army and company have been driven mad by their reversal, not just of political fortunes but of seeing that they've wasted their lives. They now know they were wrong: about the country, the free market, war for fun and profit, and what the American people really want. They made their best case and were rejected by the American people - and by history. Bush was their man and he turned out to be a fool. So now all the the Republican gurus have left is what the defeated Germans of World War Two had: a scorched earth policy. If they can't win then everyone must go down. Obama must fail! The country must fail!...Conclusion: the Fascist Formula

Here's the emerging American version of the fascist's formula: combine millions of dollars of lobbyists' money with embittered troublemakers who have a small army of not terribly bright white angry people (collected over decades through pro-life mass mailing networks) at their beck and call, ever ready to believe any myth or lie circulated by the semi literate and completely and routinely misinformed right wing - Evangelical religious underground. Then put his little mob together with the insurance companies' big bucks. That's how it works - American Brown Shirts at the ready.

What's the results of the fascist formula for the rest of us? Well, think how this "method" worked against Dr. Tiller's abortion clinic and how that story ended. In this case a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to save our economy from going bankrupt because of spiraling health care costs may be lost, not because of a better argument, but because of lies backed up by anti-democratic embittered thuggery. The motive? Revenge on America by the Old White Guys of the far right, and greed by the insurance industry.

What Can Be Done?

It's time that this whole shabby (and insane) business be exposed, vilified in run out of town on a rail by whatever responsible Republicans - if any - that are still in the party and who want to see the fortunes of their party revived. Republican leaders taking insurance industry money via lobbying firms and using it to organize what amounts to roving bands of thugs not only need to be exposed but thrown out of the public debate forever. They should become absolute pariahs.

It's time to give this garbage in name: insurance industry funded fascism."

http://www.truthout.org/080709H

There's no threat. It is simply a statement that obama's brownshirtss tactics of intimidation may be met by superior firepower. Wasn't it that darling of the left, Mao, who said that power comes out of the barrel of a gun?

Media Matters gets to the bottom of the mess in St. Louis (with link to video so you can see it for yourself.)....

"Inventing tales of a union "beating"

August 08, 2009 10:11 am ET by Eric Boehlert

The conservative blogosphere is absolutely atwitter with news that an activist was attacked by union thugs at a town hall meeting this week in St. Louis....The newspaper had no witnesses, just Gladney's account. Then Gladney's attorney got involved and from conservatives' perspective, the tale got better and better:

He went to the ground. Subsequently, two other SEIU representatives or members, however you want to say it, jumped on top of him, yelled racial epithets at him...kicked him, punched him...He sustained some injuries to his back, some bruising.

And even better:

The SEIU member used a racial slur against Kenneth, then punched him in the face. Kenneth fell to the ground. Another SEIU member yelled racial epithets at Kenneth as he kicked him in the head and back. Kenneth was also brutally attacked by one other male SEIU member and an unidentified woman. The three men were clearly SEIU members, as they were wearing T-shirts with the SEIU logo.

Gladney was clearly beaten at length (it was "brutal"), and at least from this description, was lucky to survive with his life, right?

Mary Katharine Ham wrote up an especially excited write-up at The Weekly Standard about the vicious union thugs and how Gladney was severely beaten. The only mistake Ham made was including a YouTube clip of the incident; a clip that pretty much undercuts the entire tale of run-away union violence.

Go watch the YouTube video. (Or, the "shocking video," as Power Line hypes it.) The first thing you notice when the camera starts rolling is a union member already sprawled out on the ground with somebody standing over him. No explanation of how he got there (pushed, shoved, punched?) and Ham couldn't care less. Then yes, Gladney is pulled to the ground by somebody wearing a union shirt. (At the :06 mark.) But instead of Gladney being beaten and punched, as his attorney describes, and instead of union "thugs" standing over him and threatening him, Gladney bounces right back on his feet in approximately two seconds and the scuffle ends.

That was the savage "beating" the conservative blogosphere can't stop talking about?

The only real mystery from the incident is why Tea Party member Gladney, who's seen up-close after the brief encounter walking around and talking to people and who appears to be injury-free, then decided to go to the hospital to treat injuries to his "knee, back, elbow, shoulder and face." All that from a two-second fall to the pavement?

Also unclear is why he contacted a newspaper reporter, or why his attorney wrote up lavish accounts and sent them to conservative bloggers, or why Gladney and his attorney appeared on Fox News.

FYI, according to his attorney, Gladney plans on filing a civil lawsuit against the union.

UPDATED: The Hill erroneously reported that Gladney had been "hospitalized" after being "attacked." As you can see from the video, Gladney was not "hospitalized." (i.e. Rushed away by ambulance.) Instead, as the Post-Dispatch correctly reported, Gladney "said he sought hospital treatment."

http://mediamatters.org/blog/200908080004

Adam503:

That's a whole pile of rotting horse manure. A bitter, angry screed, unhindered by the bounds of reality. Find better sources. Or better yet, stop believing lies.

And the teabaggers and republicans think this political terrorism is going to help their lost cause how, exactly? This is the kind of desperate attack tactics used by a group that has already lost the argument.

There's something happening here and you don't know what it is? Do you, Mr. Jones?

I just hope nobody gets injured before this runs it's course.

Re: "Conversion of ideas does not come at the point of a bayonet."

Perhaps you should review the history of U.S. foreign policy. (As we speak, drones are killing innocents in at least three countries that are being introduced to our form of "democracy".)

Re: "Democrats tend to welcome all people to their events, even those who might disagree with them."

Democrats don't even welcome their own to events like the recent non-town-hall on health care held by Blumenauer and Dean. This sham promised a "lottery" (bad enough, since a venue could have been found that allowed for the "town") for the many single payer activists who wanted to attend, but $1000 a plate supporters and their DP shills were given tickets without being subject to a lottery while the rest were excluded.

Thugs? Mobs? Where have you been for a year? This is Barack and his Alynskites at their best....same exact tactics used to cause confusion and chaos at the Democratic Caucuses in the Democratic Primary last year.. Pelosi called Americans who dare to disagree with these Congressional minions of Barack Obama ..people with swatstickers tatooed on their foreheads//// I am a lifelong Democrat and I say: Stop trying to push your sleezed up healthcare down our throats...Reject this Healtcare Debacle...Since when can I and everyone else not speak against the government without being called a Natzi...? Since Barack Obama and his minion usurped Democratic National Party...took over...

Reject and Redo from scratch.

I know that voice. It's my neighbor, the one that threatened to kill my dog. Yep, that's her. Send the union thugs to 4531 Jacobs St., Coos Bay, right away.

obama is a failure if your against him your a mob? sounds like fascism

"This supposed telephone call was probably placed by a left wing, merlot sipping, Prius driver ...."

You say that like its a bad thing.

Beats an ignorant redneck, Old Milwaukee guzzlin', rusted-out '72 Dodge pickup driver any day of the week.

Wrench Monkey lied when he typed:

"Democrats don't even welcome their own to events like the recent non-town-hall on health care held by Blumenauer and Dean. This sham promised a "lottery" (bad enough, since a venue could have been found that allowed for the "town") for the many single payer activists who wanted to attend, but $1000 a plate supporters and their DP shills were given tickets without being subject to a lottery while the rest were excluded."

It was actually a town hall style meeting. There was a lottery - I got a ticket. The tickets were free - I've never given Blum or Dean $1,000. Dean stated during the Q and A that "... the Democratic Party needs to move towards single payer ... " (or words to that affect) There were hard-core single payor activist in the crowd as well as students, suits, union members, and everyone under the sun. No insurance executives though (that I could see).

But unlike the mouthbreathers in the videos we see across the country there was a VERY vocal group outside the auditorium last June 5th that demand healthcare reform. But they didn't need to resort to violence and brownshirt tactics to disrupt the town hall meeting.

Once again Wrench Monkey caught pulling another lie out of his butt. Speaks to his character - or lack thereof.

Hey PNWCC you right-wing nutjob:

When people argue that this is the road to a government run system, it's because the legislation ( the general gist of all of the different versions ) creates that outcome. Obama himself is quoted on video proving he wants a single government payer system.

What is the "system" in your clinically delusional fantasies? Are you talking about "health insurance", "health care", or maybe just the black-helicopter government? Is it single-payer HEALTH INSURANCE that you refer to in your second sentence, because that has virtually no connection to your first sentence or the rest of your typical right wing delusional rant. You are, in two words. F-in nuts, or just a shill for the sick and twisted corporate and power interests inciting the right wing mobs, or maybe even both.

There is no debating with people like you because right now there are actually at least five pieces of legislation out there. The task at hand is to outshout and marginalize obstructionist freaks like you by holding you up for the public humiliation you so richly deserve so we can get back to dealing with the corrupt Republicans and Democrats in Congress to get good single payer or robust public option legislation. As much as the corporate health insurance and health care interests have already hijacked the process and legislation, none of these will actually be what either chamber puts to a floor vote in their current form. They are depending every bit as much on unhinged psychos like you in the mob to hijack the process from the outside as they are also depending on all of the Republican scumbags in Congress and the fraction of Democrats they own to further subvert the process. You actually are Ron Wyden's, Max Baucus's, and Kent Conrad's best friend and they thank you for your ignorance and your help, you pathetic loser.

Right now, you and operatives like Kari and most of his clients are actually on the same sick and twisted wrong side of this debate working to corporate health insurance and health care industry to win as you. And I'll bet that truth just drives you batshit crazier than you already are, just as it drives Kari crazy to know we see right through him and his masters.

Although you probably failed civics class, the government is YOU, and ME, and all 350mil plus Americans. When conservative jackasses like you express your contempt for government, you are really just saying you hate all of your fellow citizens, and really couldn't be bothered to educate yourself to help do the work better that we have to do collectively as a government. Like make sure, as only a single payer system can, to that nobody is blocked from accessing the doctors of their choosing by corporate criminals. And like do the hard work to insure a single payer system actually puts patients first and stand up against the predations on the system by special interests, including right wing and left wing crazies (I have Blue Oregon trash in mind here) who don't quite get it that our health care system is not the place for them to carry out their own mentally-unhinged social agendas. It is only a place for us all to pool our resources to buy health care services from private providers in the most cost effective way, including keeping a tight leash on larger corporate providers like United Healthcare, Kaiser, and even Good Sam and Providence in Oregon who would try to drive sole practitioners and small practitioner groups out of business.

So in your face and here's a website for you:

http://www.pleasecutthecrap.com/

Ferris -- "pick your weapon"? Lets ratchet is down a bit ok?

Posted by: Scott in Damascus | Aug 8, 2009 5:06:13 PM

"This supposed telephone call was probably placed by a left wing, merlot sipping, Prius driver ...."

You say that like its a bad thing.

Beats an ignorant redneck, Old Milwaukee guzzlin', rusted-out '72 Dodge pickup driver any day of the week.

Actually this obnoxious little comment nicely demonstrates what's wrong with a large contingent of people who supposedly on our side in the debate to fix our health care system to put people first.

Right now, in this fight for health care reform, we need to do much more work, with a lot more humility, to reach a lot more redneck, Old Milwaukee guzzlin', rusted-out '72 Dodge pickup driver(s) than the kind of people like SiD and left wing, merlot sipping, Prius driver(s) who share this elitist attitude, but who actually are the biggest stinking floaters clogging the sewer they are doing everything they can to flush our chances for good health care reform down.

One last comment to brain-dead idiot ludy:

obama is a failure if your against him your a mob? sounds like fascism

No you're a mob when you're against fixing a health care system on the basis of paranoid delusions what reform is about, and your only goal is mob action to stop actual reform.

And facism is when the government and corporations join together to enslave people: Like to force us to buy private health insurance or simply leave people to die who can't afford it. In case you haven't paid attention, you unhinged deluded headcase, it was Obama who ran against a mandate to buy private insurance (= anti-fascist).

It is Republicans and traitors in the Democratic Party who agree with them that believe there should be a mandate. Obama continues to not directly support a mandate, and is fully in line with the proposition that if the Republicans and Republo-crats like Wyden, Baucus, Conrad, and Nelson to manage to pass a fascist mandate, that we all have a chance to buy into a public option (= anti-facist) so we are not forced to give our money to blood-sucking corporations.

On and by the way, It is the anti-fascism to factually educate the electorate so they act collectively to preserve and drive our democracy forward to a health care system that puts people first ahead of corporate interests. It is fascism to inflame uninformed, fear-driven mobs to disrupt that democratic process. If the shoe fits, wear it.

Let's tell the truth: SEIU operatives beat up a young black man for being against the bill. The truth will win and this bill will be defeated

I mirror an earlier comment in failing to see how there is any upside to the histrionic,contrived rhetoric of the tea-baggers(and the wingnuts who troll here) and waving Hitler signs, shouting about socialism while claiming to defend Medicare. Perhaps it gives a therapeutic vent, perhaps it gives a momentary experience of power to threaten and abuse people, but it has an inverse persuasive power over the voting members of Congress, and the uncommitted public find these displays repulsive and repugnant, and certainly unconvincing,especially when they are empty of any factual substance.

That said it fits with the far right prideful ignorance. A majority of GOP believe Obama wasn't born in the U.S.(and seem content to produce phony documents to support their case), 60% of the GOP think human beings were created in their present form 6-10 thousand years ago. 6% of scientists are Republicans, and with good reason. Why be a member of a party that abhors science and reason, and worships willful ignorance?

Go worship Rush Limbaugh, trolls. He is your god and source for all your marching orders. And a great example he is, drug addict, serial marriages, sex vacations in third world countries.

I think that when I go to a Town Hall I am bring my USMC training. SEIU goons don't intimidate me. The NVA and Viet Cong couldn't. It is very strange how the SEIU apparently in the face of factual video is trying to convince the ignorant underclass that this vendor attacked them. This is very reminiscent of Hitlers Youth Corp.

"There is no doubt whatsoever that angry mobs are being mobilized by Fox"

What a complete and utter dunce (at least you aren't being a fool pn taxpayer time.)

You spin several paragraphs of how there is no proof SEIU is behind any attack and then you make a leap blaming every favorite right-wing whipping boy which is beyond any doubt.

You really shoudl listen to yourself or stick to talking to computers.

Do you think we won't defend ourselves when physically attacked by governmental operatives? We have a right to defend ourselves and a moral obligation to defend our country from fascism.

"Do you think we won't defend ourselves when physically attacked by governmental operatives?" sounds suspiciously like conspiracy theories from the 1990s.

What "governmental operatives" are going to attack you?

What is "fascist"? Trying to fix health care by something other than "free market has all the answers"?

"So you're just gonna ignore the FreedomWorks stuff, eh?"

Just like I'll ignore the Acorn group ginning up votes.

What about Moveon and CNN whipping up the anti-WTO groups about the evils of the corporate world?

PNWCC wrote:

"Craigslist has been running ads, recruiting people for months, promising to pay them a little over mininum wage to be activists for the President's agendas. Not limited to health care, but to a huge array of items."

Those ads have been running for years, not months. And they usually state which organizations are hiring and provide a link to their websites. Those jobs give you a clipboard and script and set you on a street corner near Pioneer Square where the most radical thing you'll do is try and solicit donations from tourists and wary residents.

"We have a right to defend ourselves and a moral obligation to defend our country from fascism."

Then where in God's name were you during the Bush regime?

"Just like I'll ignore the Acorn group ginning up votes."

you guys have ACORN on the brain... It's like a button on your back that folks can push and make you hop up and down and get all rootin' tootin' like Yosemite Sam. Sorry, it's just funny is all...

Wow, this thread has definitely brought out the chalupa-time internet tough guys lol.

They're definitely frustrated. Their world is passing away, and it's not coming back. A black man is president, a wise Latina is the new associate justice, and there's more where that came from. White privilege doesn't buy what it used to and there's that gotta-take-a-dump social panic among those who used to be able to tell a certain kind of "joke" without worrying about being "PC."

Their beloved "global war against terror" replete with racial towelhead overtones has gone AWOL. Hell, even capitalism itself has turned out to be a faulty brand, a deeply flawed god, the invisible hand turns out not to work, as even Greenspan confesses in the dock. WTF?!#%

That old world is collapsing, and now there's nothing left but naked incoherent rage. Frothing at the mouth, unlettered, incoherent, stuttering and quaking with sloganeering conventions, this is their Thermopylae, which they know from the cartoon version alone.

So keep your stinking socialist hands off of my Medicare or face the wrath of my Second Amendment unregistered AR50!

PNWCC wrote:

"I have a wide array of actual ITEMS in the bill, compiled by someone who's taken the time to compile them."

What you have is a list of partial sentences without context followed by inflammatory comments. I guess this is making the rounds, I saw it posted on the Portland Tea Bag site on letterhead from some fundie group I'd never heard of. Give me an hour with the Yellow Pages and I could come up a similar document of alarming fragments, "actual ITEMS" from the Yellow Pages, to prove that the phone company wants to set up panels to kill Sarah Palin's baby...

"A lawyer, in fact, a legal professor, I'm told."

Yeah, sure. Don't buy any bridges from him...

"you guys have ACORN on the brain... "

Just like you guys have Rush and Fox on your collective brains.

Oh, you silly Lib monkeys are sooo funny. Now that Conservatives are using the same tactics as MovOn and Code Pink, your running around in your government-subsidized cages and throwing your poo. Lib monkeys are sooo predictable...

Hey Duped:

"Actually this obnoxious little comment nicely demonstrates what's wrong with a large contingent of people who supposedly on our side in the debate to fix our health care system to put people first.

Right now, in this fight for health care reform, we need to do much more work, with a lot more humility ..."

First, this was not a little obnoxious comment, it was a really snarky comment.

Second, why don't you go all Harry Reid on my ass and lecture me about reaching across the aisle and "bipartisanship?" What you don't seem to understand is that these people, bottom-feeding Republicans, have absolutely no interest in what you have to say. These are the same people that scream "I don't want the government touching my Medicare!" without the slightest touch of irony. They are morally and financially bankrupt and having lost nearly their entire power base in the last election, they are singularly focused on attacking anything that is progressively associated with the liberal movement.

Sal and Bill above got it right - the right is driven by blind ideology and ignorance. This is the same group that believes Iraq attacked the U.S. on 9/11, Obama was born in Kenya, the earth was created 6,000 years ago, and it's OK to home school your children with the Bible and a GED.

So go ahead Duped, with deep humility sit across the table from these brownshirts and sing a rousing chorus of "Kumbaya" with a group hug and write me in 6 months your efforts on improving energy, education, the environment, and healthcare.

Rightwing nutjob Steve wrote:

"So you're just gonna ignore the FreedomWorks stuff, eh?"

Just like I'll ignore the Acorn group ginning up votes.

Your ACORN delusion the right wing keeps spreading never happened Scott. You need to get back on your meds. Put up the references to back your point: All you be able to point to is the paranoid right-wing conspiratorial blogosphere.

Hey Scott, you typically ignorant Blue Oregon fool SNARKY=OBNOXIOUS. As in SCOTT=DUMBASS.

And obviously your IQ is lower than dirt: Read the rest of what I wrote you smug jerk.

It's Democrats like you, (or are you just masquerading as a Democrat to stir up things? That's really what Kari is all about) and the insurance company defending Democrats, with their pal Republicans who are together working to stop us from getting health care reform.

Ignorant, arrogant, smug, lying jerks like you are the biggest problem we face at the grassroots, which is exactly what I'm talking about. You want to get in the face of a right winger in a productive way: Get in his or her face BECAUSE you respect them enough and recognize why they are so fearful to get in their face, not because you're an arrogant, superior jerk like you who talks like you don't actually give a damn about anybody but your own egotistical self and who I find to actually be most disgusting because of that.

PNWCC, although Ron has already responded:

"I have a wide array of actual ITEMS in the bill, compiled by someone who's taken the time to compile them."

Add this to his comment and your reading list:

www.pleasecutthecrap.com

Once you're back in touch with reality, than we can figure out what to do about the genuinely outrageous things corporate Democrats and Republicans who actually don't give a damn about their constituents, and smug, superior, social-engineer freaks from the paranoid radical right and twisted elitist NW-style left (of which Scott apparently self identifies as one) support in this legislation.

Hey Duped:

"Hey Scott, you typically ignorant Blue Oregon fool ..."

Thank you for the compliment.

Oh, by the way, I'm one of those ignorant, arrogant, smug, lying, egotistical, Merlot sipping, disgusting, jerk, single payor advocates.

I'm also anti-run on sentences.

p.s. I'm curious - what exactly did I lie about?

Wow. It's interesting you mention the assault in St. Louis. It's also interesting that you -don't- mention that the assault was of a black "tea partier", and that the six arrests were all SEIU members.

In fact, the only documented violence at any town hall/tea party has been from Obama supporters.

The caller in question is "threatening" that some Americans will defend themselves when attacked.

SEIU members, on the other hand, actually put a peaceful protester in a wheelchair in St Louis.

If the SEIU dislikes violence, they may want to give it up.

Read this:

Conservative Defector Spills All On Town Halls

right-wing_turncoat_gives_the_inside_scoop_

The Dick Armey Freedom works web sites mentioned were discussed in prior Blue Oregon stories when Freedom Works played all of those anti-environmentalist commercials and stole and copied web site for Keep the Lights on Oregon at Keep the Lights on Oregon and created a counter group at Lights on Oregon

I might ad that at that time I understand numerous groups including the Merkely campaign and individuals were contacted by Keep the Lights on Oregon and no one would help the persue this issue.

Now they are back- their poster child is Sarah Palin and along with the extreme right-wing Neo-Nazi, KKK, Skin Heads, John Birchers they are hijacking the Republican Party for 2012- So get all of the little liberal minds used to the idea-

IMHO the only way to beat them is to deny them a forum and use an alternative forum rather than public town halls to promote the politricans until this series runs its course.

SEIU members, on the other hand, actually put a peaceful protester in a wheelchair in St Louis.

If the SEIU dislikes violence, they may want to give it up.

DRH --- you're just another pathetic right- wing paranoid nutjob. Here's a few facts rubbed in your pathetic face:

1) "Hot Air" is a right-wing crackpot website (as if the name is not a big enough tip off) and the story --- in the way reported there --- is false.

2) That video does not show any attack. It starts after whatevery happened to Gladney happened.

3) In fact, there also is an SEIU person on the ground who all reports say had nothing to do with Gladney and may in fact have been attacked by right-wing nutjobs who actually have been provoking these confrontations.

4) The actual facts about who attacked Gladney, why, and how he actually got hurt to the extent he did remain completely unknown and probably never will be known.

5) The only "fact" we have about who attacked Gladney is his claim. He has not positively ID'd any attacker.

So on the basis of those facts, and in the wake of the fact the right wing mob has been turned out by the insurance industry to aggressively shutdown any debate, you're going to crap on your own personal credibility by making patently false assertion like this?

You are a sorry whackjob DRH, just like the rest of the freaks on your side who are out there trying to whip up the (racist) mob. That's not all right-wingers or even most of them. Just the psychotic freaks like you who made deranged assertions like you make here.

In fact, the only documented violence at any town hall/tea party has been from Obama supporters.

And Marc, you too are a deranged whackjob. As just noted, you are flat wrong. The attacker of Gladney has not been ID'd as yet and there certainly is no evidence he is actually an "Obama supporter".

But mentally ill crazies like you actually don't care about the facts, do you?

The escalating rage invokes nothing positive for anyone.

KC Hanson, you're smug superior attitude, reflective of a junior high sensibility that seems to be about the maturity level of much of the NW impotent left, is exactly why trash like Wyden is fighting a left-guard action hand-in-hand with the right-wing thugs to give the insurance industry everything. If you can't take the heat, just shut up and whine in a corner somewhere instead of trying to make yourself the center of attention --- which is all your comment is about since you don't add anything of substance.

And Scott-in-Damascus --- you once again prove with your smug arrogance why people like you are the biggest problem we have on our side in this reform. Exactly why do you think noting you support single-payer, by once again classifying yourself as a smug, superior, dumbass, who probably is for single-payer for a lot of the wrong reasons that give the right-wing justification for being fearful and opposed, is useful to do at all?

To all the right-wing headcase crackpots here: In all your muddled paranoid ravings, there is one thing you are right about, even if you have twisted it out of all relation to reality: It is the smug superior, faction of health care reform advocates --- regardless of whether they support a single-payer, public option, or corporate facsist purely private insurance system --- who do see an opportunity to load on other social-engineering agendas. Scott, Kari, and a lot of Blue Oregonians are in that category, unfortunately. However, most of the honorable, intelligent, decent people on our side of the table whose real goal is to make sure your kids and our kids, your parents and our parents, your spouses and our spouses, your friends and our friends, you and us, have access to health care in the most affordable way possible, without government or insurance company bureaucrats between us and our doctors, are as afraid of these whackjobs on our side as you are right to be.

That's why we are fighting them and the agendas they are trying to load on just as hard as we are fighting the anti-reform agenda you are pushing for your own dishonorable reasons. So how do you like that hard, cold, truth?

And SiD, what you "lied" about is how you completely mischaracterized my comments to try to make your point, without any direct cites of anything I said that support the clear implicature you are making about my position.

Second, why don't you go all Harry Reid on my ass and lecture me about reaching across the aisle and "bipartisanship?"

So go ahead Duped, with deep humility sit across the table from these brownshirts and sing a rousing chorus of "Kumbaya" with a group hug and write me in 6 months your efforts on improving energy, education, the environment, and healthcare.

Not only will you not find anything suggesting anything of the sort in my comments; your only goal is to further your case by twisting the words of those who see right through those who are a big problem on our side.

A number of commenters have mentioned "MoveOn.org tactics", with at least one mentioning their involvement in the WTO protests in Seattle.

I am not aware of MoveOn.org being involved in any way with the anti-WTO movement. Any documentation, or any documentation of MoveOn.org involved anywhere in tactics of intimidation?

The first thing I want is for my local to stop taking money from Me for a health plan that I do not want or need !

I was the candidate of 'hope' and 'change' in 1932 Germany. I promised a new dawn. I vowed to change my country so much it could never be changed back. I wanted a clean break with the old policies of the past. I enacted a national healthcare system. I pushed a national public area smoking-ban. I was a vegetarian and I loved movies. Who am I?

Hey Kari: I made comments in this thread (I thought?), now seeming to be nowhere to be found. Or was this same item above also a header on a thread very similar, so similar I can't recall a difference just now?

Just checkin'.

Are You the same person who implemented a Nationalist Socialist health care system in Germany in the 30's ?

Hey pop quiz: An ignoramus? Read Hartmann's When Democracy failed.....oh yeah, you guys have your "own" set of "experts" dontcha? FYI, since you people don't seem to read...."Liberal" is pretty much the OPPOSITE of "Nazi", but you don't worry your little head about details, K?

Hey Liberals; better learn that being nice doesn't cut it with terrorists [remember, they have said so for a decade!]......which is what these righty's look like more every day....

These manufactured threats are so transparently false. Democrats faking these threats should be ashamed of themselves.

The congressman in my home district refused to do town halls because of supposed 'threats'.

He simply knows that there is overwhelming opposition to his party's takeover of the health care system.

Democrats are busy faking violence against themselves.

<h2>I'm not sure which is funnier, the fake vandal or the fake doctor that spoke up in favor of Obamacare at Sheila Jackson Lee's (D-TX) town hall.</h2>