House Dems Coordinate On Town Hall Meetings, Protesters
Moments ago, House Democrats concluded a caucus conference call to discuss, among other things, strategy for dealing with the new, potentially hostile, environments at town halls in their districts. I'll fill in the blanks with more info as it becomes available, but the long and short of it is that--astroturf or not--the news early this week served as a wake up call to Democrats, and over the last 24 hours or so they've been coalescing around a strategy for managing their events, and advancing their recess message, with or without interruptions.
Late update: On the call, Democrats agreed to push ahead with August plans and messages. Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-TX) recounted his run-in with rowdy protesters to prepare members who haven't been accosted for what to expect and how to react.
Josh
Matt
Eric
Brian
Got blindsided alright...OFA in SFBay Area at least not linked to townhalls via OFA site...
August 5, 2009 1:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
We can expect one of two things from the Democratic "leadership":
1) a stirring call to ignore the rethugs and not to "descend" to their level : i.e. - exactly the wrong thing to do, or
2) a call to activate the people on their email lists and to drum up support at these town hall meetings -- but still they will continue to advance people to have respect for the rethugs.
Please God let it be No. 2, and them show some freaking spine for once.
Not very likely. We progressives have decades of "bending over backwards" and being fair to our political enemies.
Newsflash guys : The time for being fair is long over. Show up, get in their face and meet any shouts or violence with the SAME.
Trying to be "fair" with thugs only empowers them. Bring your rage at the health "care" corps - blood merchants, and bring a bat.
August 5, 2009 1:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
Goon squad tactics aren't the answer. Have the House rep or moderator lay down ground rules at the outset. Make sure everyone understands anyone disrupting the meeting will be arrested and hauled out by cops. That usually is more than enough to shut up the weasels.
August 5, 2009 1:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
Agreed, stop trying to be "fair" to these pricks.
Also, why bothering playing nice when we all knwo by now that NO FUCKING REPUBLICANS WILL VOTE FOR THIS. What is his, Lucy with the football? How many House GOP voted for stimulus? How many Senate GOP voted for Sotomayor? I rest my case.
I don't know about bringing a bat, but playing hardball is what is needed.
Liberals are often handicapped here, because liberals are, broadly speaking, softies at heart. Otherwise, you'd just be an asshole cold-hearted conversative ("let the poor fend for themselves, not my problem.") If the other side has a compassion-deficiency, liberals have a ruthlessness-deficiency.
August 5, 2009 1:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
So true.
August 6, 2009 10:07 AM | Reply | Permalink
Right. Nazis have street thugs so the Social Democrats get thugs too. That approach just worked out swimmingly for everyone, especially the Social Democrats.
August 5, 2009 2:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
Playing hardball =/= being a thug
August 5, 2009 3:02 PM | Reply | Permalink
Oops, I see you were replying somebody else.
August 5, 2009 3:03 PM | Reply | Permalink
Violence is not yet called for. When you start to see mobs roaming the streets, destroying property and beating people up, that's when your right to self-defense kicks in. When you start to hear about death squads and people being "disappeared" go ahead and start forming your guerrilla resistance.
Until then, obey the rule of law because it's the only thing separating our society from despotism.
August 5, 2009 6:19 PM | Reply | Permalink
My idea from an earlier thread:
1) Invite the noisiest one up to the podium.
2) Ask him if the current health care system is the best imaginable.
3) Ask him his ideas on how to improve the current system.
4) Ask him how much he pays for his current health care. If he says $200 a month, tell him at the current rate of increases, that means his children will be paying $1,600 a month in 30 years. Ask him if he thinks that's sustainable.
5) Ask him if he knows that VA care and Medicare are government run programs.
6) After letting him air his views, ask him if he minds letting others in the room have the same opportunity.
August 5, 2009 1:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
Again, the fallacy of being "fair" to rethugs.
What you say is, of course, completely reasonable and logical. Here's the problem : the rethugs are neither of those.
Here is what will happen. The invited rethug will go up to the podium, scream and over-talk his list of memorized robotic talking points - then scream a rebel yell -- to the cheers of his fellow rethugs.
Assuming the moderator gets in a few words, the rethug will not just continue as before -- overshouting any discourse and repeating his asinine talking points, but now with a mike.
You make the mistake of so many progressives, trying to use reason and logic with those who have abandoned both.
August 5, 2009 1:43 PM | Reply | Permalink
I don't think so, ctal. If they shout their own down, they'll just look totally unreasonable.
The point isn't to convince the teabaggers. It's to reveal them as exactly what you describe.
August 5, 2009 2:03 PM | Reply | Permalink
But they do not care how they "look." They do not mind appearing to be the idiots that they know themselves to be. Greed has no shame, and this whole conflict is ultimately about protecting their beloved stash of dollars --nothing more.
August 6, 2009 10:11 AM | Reply | Permalink
Good Lord, they really are making this harder than it needs to be. Any meeting has rules of engagement. Make them. Enforce them. Civil discourse inside. Protest outside.
August 5, 2009 1:43 PM | Reply | Permalink
And a lot of cops in the hall to make the point.
August 5, 2009 2:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yup. The thought of spending several hours in the local jail will make them think twice.
August 5, 2009 6:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
Sure, except whom do you think the cops are supporting?
August 6, 2009 10:12 AM | Reply | Permalink
The people who pay their salaries, ie the people they know locally, who are not the ones stirring up the shit at these town halls.
August 6, 2009 11:29 AM | Reply | Permalink
The police I know are generally interested in making sure things stay peaceful, no matter their political persuasion. An unruly mob is a cop's anathema.
August 6, 2009 11:38 AM | Reply | Permalink
Why did the Democrats need a "wake-up" call in the first place?
Virginia Foxx was talking about killing the old people well over a week ago. Democrats somehow thought the right wing was going to sit back and let reform happen?
What is wrong with them? Seriously?
August 5, 2009 1:48 PM | Reply | Permalink
They thought they were going to get a bill out of both houses and on its way to conference by August, which would have changed the whole dynamic and made a lot of this effort facially pointless. Then, even as it became obvious that that wasn't going to happen, they didn't want to be seen doing planning to deal with this crap--which they had to know was coming because the Republicans and the insurance companies were being quite frank about it--for fear that it would turn the "no bill before recess" plan into a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Or at least that's my theory.
August 5, 2009 2:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
Sounds reasonable. However, why did they think this:
They thought they were going to get a bill out of both houses and on its way to conference by August
I'm trying, hard, to understand Democrats, and it's very easy to be standing on the sidelines complaining about them, but why do they have any expectations for Republicans or Blue Dogs? These entities didn't just spring up over night in opposition to the President...This just seems like some bad strategery on the part of Democrats, and it's getting tiresome at this point.
Failure to enact real change will simply handicap the President and make him less popular. And the Dems less popular. Who're the Dems going to turn to to campaign for them next year?
Why does it continually seem like they enjoy shooting themselves in the foot?
August 5, 2009 2:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
"Why does it continually seem like they enjoy shooting themselves in the foot?"... Now you know how I felt when McCain won the nomination last time...Hang in there...it'll pass...
August 5, 2009 4:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
It's pretty clear to any politician who's even half awake that the protesters are in no way shape or form "swing voters". These wingnuts will never vote for a Dem. So I don't expect they'll sway many congresspeople either. It's the people without such strong opinions on health reform that I'd be watching if I were running a town hall.
August 5, 2009 2:03 PM | Reply | Permalink
Ben Nelson whines that his "office is currently getting calls at a nine-to-one rate from individuals who don't want him to support a public option for insurance coverage."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/08/04/ben-nelson-personally-cal_n_250801.html?view=print
At least he whines. The other Senator Nelson appears to be hiding under his bed on the subject. He has not uttered ONE WORD about health care reform in the past month and a half as far as I know. He's on the finance committee, but not in the gang of six. Maybe he's mad because he's not in the decision-making group.
At least I get form letters from my republican congressman and republican senator in response to faxes I've sent. Absolutely nothing from Bill Nelson. Where is he anyway? Chasing pythons?
August 5, 2009 2:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
Both parties have totally neglected their constituents for years, have disregarded putting people into positions who would actually regulate the folks they are supposed to regulate, have run this nation into the ground with wars they don't even bother to investigate BEFORE sending others to their deaths, have assured continual need for oil simply because they need to keep their important friends in power, have continually lied to get their positions and after gaining power disregard any ethical or moral responsibility,... etc.
I think it's time for commoners to protest BOTH mobs, since fifty or sixty years of doing nothing but paying respects to these clowns have only led us to our present dilemma.
Afterwards, though, I would hope these same folks would put their effort into voting for NON Democrats and NON Republican candidates... IMHO
August 5, 2009 2:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yeah, that worked great in 2000. Nothing like 8 years of Bush to drive home how similar the two parties are.
August 5, 2009 3:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yes.
A more sensible solution to the "take my marbles and go home" routine is to simply work for BETTER Democrats.
Daily Kos talks about this all the time. Better, bluer Dems is what we need. Primary is how that happens. They are not all bad.
August 5, 2009 5:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well, they need to get serious.
1. Ticket the event out of the Congressperson's office, ticket's requiring a match with ID such as a driver's license. Make Nametags in advance, and require that participants wear them. Do not ticket or admit persons who are not resident in the congressperson's district.
2. Have a moderator -- strong character, and ask that questions be written on printed index cards. Sort the cards by topic, and let the moderator phrase the questions. If the audience is attentive and orderly, it is easy to switch to more questions from the audience.
3. Make it clear anyone who is disruptive will be removed from the site. Make certain Law Enforcement is present, in uniform, and obvious.
August 5, 2009 2:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
They keep yelling about nazis and SS and brownshirts which of course they have no idea about but I say request strong law enforcement presence. You violate, you leave. No signs, no noisemakers, people who are already agitating and agitated aren't let in. They wouldn't let me enter a ballgame with a sign or anything disruptive it should surely be at least that much to make democracy work. Because just like spoiled children who don't get their way, if this isn't dealt with now it will make this country forever poorer. This will be the new way to get what you want. Not at the ballot but with violent real nazi style thuggery.
August 5, 2009 4:17 PM | Reply | Permalink