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Ross, Snyder Meet Angry Crowd In Arkansas Town Hall

Here's another rowdy town hall meeting, this time from Arkansas.

Rep. Mike Ross (D-AR), the leader of the Blue Dogs, plus Rep. Vic Snyder (D-AR), were confronted by angry folks at a town hall meeting in Little Rock. It's unclear whether this was any sort of organized effort, or whether it was a loose set of angry people who happened to all show up to the same meeting. The attendees' overall theme was that their way of life was being destroyed:

"At this point in my life, I have never seen my America turned into what it has turned into, and I want my America back," said one woman, on the verge of tears. "And I don't think the Representatives and Senators are gonna be able to do it. I'm scared!"

When Snyder said, "Mike and I do not support a single-payer system, we are not interested in a single-payer system," people began yelling back things like, "That's bull," and "That's what Obama wants." Ross put his head in his hands during the heckling.


26 Comments

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People are so misinformed its pathetic.

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That is certainly true and the fault of Democrats. There is no central trusted source of information on a bill that is too long and complicated to read, even by legislators.

OTOH enough facts have emerged to scare the bejesus out of tax payers, and this is the result. Doping up Grandma to pay for abortions isn't going to go over well, especially when most high end taxpayers are senior citizens.

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I look forward to your explanation for why the extinction of dinosaurs was the fault of Democrats.

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"facts"

GTFO, troll.

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Dude, it's totally a fact that Obama wants to kill your grandmother. His uncle's e-mails never lie!

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Explain why the public is so scared of the cost of public health care and its effect on the deficit while they never blinked at the costs of Bu$h's need for $trillions of dollars that bloated the deficit?

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Because Bush wasn't a secret Muslim from Kenya.

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You know, I keep hearing that Obama isn't doing a good job of explaining his health care plan and to some extent it's true. But there are some people, like the ones we are seeing at these town halls, who do not trust him, who despise him and won't believe anything that he or his representatives say.

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Considering Obama's record so far that's not surprising. So far he's...
* Bailed out Wall St,
* Insisted on a fast passage of stimulus which doesn't seem to be helping many,
* Took over GM and Chrysler, then gave them to the unions,
* Threatened tax hikes from a variety of sources like letting the Bush cuts expire, adding Cap and Trade, and surcharges for healthcare,
* Spent up a deficit larger than Bush's first seven years combined,
* Let it leak that middle class tax cuts are on the way via Treasury,
* Picked a New Justice on the basis of political correctness,
* And mostly because he delegates the bad news to Congress while remaining apart from the controversies.
All in all, pretty amazing for 6 months in office.

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Just in case people here aren't familiar with shooter242, he's a well known troll who evidently has nothing better to do than spam copy/pasted right-wing whining 24/7 on virtually every major progressive web site. It's really fairly pathetic. Ignore his chain letter regurgitation and he'll go back to rage-spamming Salon.

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This is very good advice. Those of you who are tempted to respond to troll bullshit need to understand that you are only making him happy.

One should never wrestle with a pig, you both get covered in shit and the pig likes it.

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Sorry hon, you must think you are talking to one of your easily brainwashed uninformed friends. I don't buy into fear, lies and panic.

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Independent thought is tough, I know, but you should really try it sometime, it's a hoot.

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"At this point in my life, I have never seen my Amerikkka turned into what it has turned into, and I want my Amerikkka back," said one woman, on the verge of tears. "And I don't think the Representatives and Senators are gonna be able to do it. I'm scared!"

fixed.

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Cry me a fucking river river, lady. Less than a year ago, 53 percent of this country went out and voted for Obama as president. They also voted in increase the Dem majority in the Congress. The healthcare legislation that we ultimately will get this year will likely be less than what Obama said he wanted during the campaign. You want your American back from whom? I'm sorry your side lost but you're going to fucking cry about it? Save it, loser.

I'm sorry, I have no sympathy for folks like this. Those tears were manufactured or tears of anger that some nigra is in the WH. Where were your tears when St. Ron or Man of God GWB were running up huge deficits?

Lots of white hairs getting angry in that crowd. You know, the folks who currently get Social Security checks and who get their health insurance through Medicare. Don't mess with my socialist benefits, you socialists!

By the way, can anybody tell me just what in the hell the first guy and that last woman were talking about? They didn't seem unhinged or nuts but I just have no idea what their points were or what they were asking.

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These people's America didn't lose in the last election, it won, in spite of them; they are just too dumb to know it.

Obama is fighting to give these very people better access to health care. For instance, the first guy said that he didn't have health insurance. Why is he fighting against the reform?

"I've never seen my America...(blah, blah)....I'm scared." Of course she is scared, Obama is a Negro after all, and if that wasn't enough he is a Democrat. But then Bill Clinton was a Democrat and they love him in Arkansas.

My whole life I thought that racism was hatred, in the past few years I see that racism is fear and ignorance. The world looks different now.

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"Doping up Grandma to pay for abortions"

And where in any of the proposed legislation going through Congress can you find this? Nowhere...because it's a lie. It's all your side has - lies and fearmongering. Same old story.

By the way, you folks are all worried about government telling you what procedures you can and can't have. Last time I checked, abortion is legal and is covered by many private insurers. So it's OK for the government to say "no" to that particular medical procedure. I'm actually willing to forego abortion as a covered procedure in order to get legislation passed, but please explain the hypocrisy.

Also, there is nothing in the bill stating that private insurers have to cover abortion.

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What's to be scared of? We've still got preventive detention, the state secrets privilege, a couple of wars, amnesty for war criminals, don't ask don't tell . . . Oh right, I forgot, the government's going to take over Medicare. And a nigger in the White House.

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A nigger who is going to give all of the god-fearing white folks' hard-earned dollars to a bunch of undeserving, lazy, good for nothing niggers and spics.

Isn't that really what it all comes down to?

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This is nothing more than censorship. It's about time the DoJ start getting their act together, round these misfits up, read them the riot act and give them a stern warning, which they will follow up on it they step over the line one more time. There is a difference between freedom of speech and censorship. They need to be educated by the government whose job it is is to enforce the Law.

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Josh made a very astute observation that as these mobs grow out of control, their actual agenda will become apparent to everyone who's paying attention.

Case in point is this woman who weeps because she's scared that "her America" is slipping away from her. I'm not sure what she means by this. For what it's worth, I think it's more than just the black guy in the White House.

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I think it's the growing realization that this country is becoming less WASP with every passing day. It's been a growing reality for years but having a black dude in the WH really puts a face on that reality. It's also the reality that a growing portion of the American population - of all religions, colors, ethnicities, etc - is concentrated in our nations larger cities and that even in red states, those larger cities are getting bluer by the day. (for example, my guess is that Little Rock is a lot more blue and progressive today than it was 10 years ago)

What she's truly afraid of is progress. I think a lot of these folks are afraid that the world is passing them by. It is...but they need to catch up because the world ain't going to go backwards no matter how much they want it to.

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I agree completely. What I find amazing about all these people who want to go back to earlier times is they never seem to realize that the good times weren't really that good. You want to go back to the 60s? When drinking fountains were segregated, fulfilling careers for women were almost unheard of, and people weren't aware of how deadly cigarette smoke was? I'll take present day America, with all its imperfections and problems, thank you very much.

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Btw, while I've made fun of the fool who was crying and some of the questions the opponents of reform were asking, I have to say that this event was one of the more civil that I've seen. Not a lot of screaming, no silly birther signs, no chanting, etc. Sure, many of the folks asking questions are asking about lies or asking about - well, I don't know what - but they're being pretty civil and are referring to documents that contain information. (notice I didn't say facts)

As for the crying lady - she was just being ridiculous. And so were the folks who applauded her acting job.

One thing I've also noted in the videos of many of these events - the Dem politicians targeted have generally kept their cool and have been pretty smooth in responding to the criticism - that is, when they can respond above the chanting and screaming. But then the rabble rousers at most of these events don't want to hear a response - and that is evident from the fact that they start yelling, "No!", or, "That's a lie!", before two words come out of the politician's mouth. (again, this even appears to be somewhat of exception - except for the Drudge-based reaction to Ross saying that single-payer is not in any of the plans)

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Apparently the Blue Dogs aren't kissing Wingnut ass quite hard enough. I would hope that this would be a lesson to them. Steny got an earful too, so if we have any luck at all this turning on their own, as the tea baggers are doing with their Blue Dog brethren, will move the Blue Dogs in a more Democratic direction. (I don't really think it will but one can hope....)

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For years the left-progressives have been the stepchildren of the Democratic party. Maybe now they will stop kicking us around and realize who their REAL FRIENDS are. If it weren't for us, McCain would be president.

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