On The Media

There's still the issue that these protestations aren't grounded in any reality. No one is taking away their coveted private health insurance and replacing it with government-run insurance--unless they make the choice to do so themselves. The people inciting them to disrupt town halls are just feeding them lies to get them angry. At least when those on the left use disuptive tactics, they do it for good reasons, like stopping unjust wars or social injustice. These town hall disrupters are just delusional.

As documented MANY times over, the public plan and taxes on private insurance benefits it’s a the stealth way to single payer health care. Too many people, our own Dear Leader included, have been caught on tape saying this.

Claims of “astroturfing” are a convenient way to play this movement off, and lets be clear this is a movement. Its no spawn of Saul Alinsky either. What we are witnessing is the potential infancy of the second American revolution.

We use our words now and move on to more drastic measures later.

"Johnny Rebel?" AHH HA HA HA!!!! One might be worried if your comment weren't such a pathetic joke! These "protesters" are laughable, completely undermining intelligent discourse in the democracy they so vehemently purport to love. These morons actually think that idiotic barking and disruption is the way to win debating points. Oh yeah! The majority of Americans will really buy in to that! Socially incompetent infants also yell and throw tantrums when they don't get their way.

"Wittle baby's candidate not wim da ewecshum? Ohhhhhh...Poor baby! Ohhhhhh." HA HA HA!

A handful of idiots whose cultural intolerance and gullibility causes them to consistently vote against their own interests are not likely to dominate any national discourse for long. Even if they could have significant impact on national policy, they'd just be screwing themselves along with everyone else, so at least the rest of us would get a good laugh out of it.

Just sit back and let these pebble brains put the last few nails in the conservative coffin. Come 2010, plenty enough Americans will know precisely where to place the blame for government inaction: squarely on the shoulders of these fanatical conservatives.

It would be great to focus the mandate aspect of the reform effort.

NPR's ATC did a three part series on paying for healthcare in Howard County, MD http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=105417097

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=105444714&ps=rs

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=105508476&ps=rs

where residents could sign up for subsidized healthcare for $50-$85 a month. Now that may not sound like a lot but as the story was told, many citizens living paycheck to paycheck put the charge on credit cards and after a few months the automatic billing would come back declined.

It seems this new bill intends to cover every American by forcing them to buy insurance. Hell, that could have been done years ago.

The mandate aspect would likley become a question to ask the Court. That is to say, is a program like this constitutional (like Social Security, Medicare etc.) or is it in fact compelling citizens to purchase a specific product by decree.

I can see that happening if the mandate gets signed into law.

Farting in the opera house??? What an idea! Saul Alinsky had a ripping sense of humor (pun intended).

I haven't been to any town hall meetings to see for myself, but from the videos it looks like a lot of senior citizens. I can't picture the seniors working for lobbyists as a part of a rent-a-mob. They don't need the money.

I wish there was this kind of anger over deficit spending and the national debt. But, of course, the seniors don't give a rip about that. They are all about getting more free stuff, and hanging onto the free stuff they have. And yet, they will care ... the day after our creditors finally cut us off, and the social security checks stop flowing.

These so-called "grassroots" protesters are being bankrolled by the corporate elite and their henchmen--unlike us grassroots protesters of yore (civil rights, antiwar) who in fact were from the grassroots. Nobody was bankrolling us, or if they were, they weren't the corporate elite, and our aims were to expand democracy, not shut it down. You've made a fundamental error of "gotcha" journalism: similarities in form do not denote similarities of content or purpose. As so often, Bob Garfield, you drag the subject up to the superficial level, rather than giving it the depth of treatment it deserves.

I was intrigued by the statement that these protesters are directly analogous to MoveOn.org, since I have some recent--and very wary--connection with MoveOn. All of their current training and guidance emphasizes respectful but repeated communication with the intent to influence local congresspeople in one's own district.

Here (http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/8/4/761608/-Tea-Baggers-FAIL-to-disrupt-Health-Care-meeting,-lessons-shared.#c) is an interesting report of one of the recent town meetings organized by various progressive organizations and coordinated with (not by) MoveOn but entirely in keeping with the guidance we got here in Stonington when we organized a local Clean Energy media event.

I have never heard of an antiwar demonstration that involved shouting speakers down as a deliberate tactic. Can anyone cite such an event? I'd be grateful for the information. The introductory remarks quoted in the link above clearly spell out the role of town meetings in a democracy and the anti-democratic nature of disruption intended to silence debate. The description of what happened at the meeting also clearly indicates that the "teabaggers" were sincerely concerned and generally responded very well to the rules laid down at the outset, which created an orderly and respectful meeting.

I am so tired of the willful blindness and convenient amnesia that goes on with both the far right AND far left when it comes to almost anything involving issues and tactics. Of course the left has shouted down speakers, even resorting to violence in many cases. There are far too many stories of this happening on college campuses and elsewhere to require examples since anyone on this message board knows how to Google. SDS and Weathermen, anyone? There are respectful, logical debating elements on the conservative and liberal sides, just as there are mouth foaming, even violence advocating people within each movement. Anyone remember famous liberal Alec Baldwin's rant on The Late Show, I think it was? He said "if we were in another country... we would stone Henry Hyde to death and we would go to their homes and kill their wives and their children. We would kill their families, for what they're doing to this country." But I guess to some people that is civilized debate.

My point is there are millions of people that have legitimate concerns about this new legislation which changes something very fundamental to us all. It is ridiculous to claim that all the people that are upset at these town hall meetings are doing it because they are stupid and acting against their own interests. Just as income taxes have gone from a tiny little thing that was grudgingly introduced into American lives to become one of the most complicated, manipulated aspects of government that has been used to ruin people, there is fear based in reality that this will get out of control and is just another nail in the coffin of us really being able to have our own lives making our own choices, which gets less all the time.

Yes David, we all have so much choice regarding our health care options... the insurance industry bends over backwards to accommodate us all.

I work for a company which allows its employees to vote on a benefits package every three years, and for the last nine years we’ve had to vote one trade-off over another as coverage has dwindled little by little… and my company consistently makes it into Forbes Top 100 Work Places (usually in the top 30). I don’t even have to imagine how the rest of the country is faring in this regard, as the horror stories are absolutely plentiful.

The propaganda right-wing organizers use to brainwash these sub-humans states specifically the goal of intimidating legislators to vote against the reform that was mandated by a strong majority in a presidential election.

I’m betting the public will blame these fanatics for forcing their obstructionist agenda on the rest of the country… it’s hardly a difficult argument to make, as videos of these pebble heads will be plastered all over You Tube for years to come.

Health care is a tangible problem now for a majority of Americans. It’s no chore predicting the problem will be proportionately worse by the end of 2010… and those incriminating videos will be played again and again.

-And as I recall, every episode I saw of the left trying to disrupt a political forum during Bush's and the Republican's reign, they were summarily rounded up, marched out, and/or arrested by whichever goons were at hand.

My point wasn't that the health insurance industry as it exists today is perfect by any means. I have been fairly happy with mine and thought they were pretty good when my wife had cancer a few years ago. Was it without frustration? No, but nothing major and they were very helpful in getting things right. Of course there are horror stories of insurance companies doing the wrong thing. Do you honestly believe there won't be horror stories if/when the govenment runs it?

Of course, when you use perjoratives like sub-human and pebble heads, you ironically demonstrate the very thing you accuse the right wing of. Are you incapable of making your point without resorting to this kind of name calling? And by the way, the entire premise of our politics is to let your politician know that your vote depends on them agreeing with you. You can call that intimidation, I call it electoral politics. Now I don't support willful misinformation of any kind, left or right. But people voted for Obama on the notion of reform, not specifics because there weren't any. One of the problems now is that there aren't a lot even in these bills. A lot of the wording is vague, and the huge rush to pass one of these proposed legislative acts has not allowed time to debate the specifics. Sure the concept of reform has been out there a long time, and certainly the worst abuses of the insurance industry need to be regulated away. But these massive (and massively expensive) current proposals have been ramrodded through in a few weeks. Considering trillions of dollars and our welfare is at stake, is it too much to ask for a bit more transparency and deliberation?

Your last paragraph is absurd. I didn't agree with having protests walled off blocks from the event, and the couple of cases where arrests were made were shameful. But the way you phrase it is just a leftist rant, ignoring the intimidations that happen to conservatives when they disagree with liberals.

I'm curious David of RI, what dwindling array of choices are you claiming the gov't is taking away from you? I hear this talking point from the Ron Paul crowd all the time and yet they can't substantiate this. The gov't says when you have to go to bed? The gov't says what you should eat? The gov't says what? If anyone is restricting your choices, it's more often the corporations you owe money to.

David from Rhode Island,

Please stick to approved talking points about Health Care, i mean, Health Insurance Reform. Don't forget to email us if anyone disagrees with the talking points or has any fishy ideas about maintaining real competition among healthcare providers and insurance companies.

Thanks

The White House

P.S. The pejorative of subhuman has been approved for use against opponents of the President, we have a mandate for heaven's sake!

I'm going to have to go with David on this government limiting our choices argument.

The government now tells us which corporations we can and can't sue, and what we can sue them for; which corporations we can slander or not; which country we can by our drugs from as to not undermine american corporate interests; etc...

I'm feeling like I have less choice all the time.

So Petey, who do you think used lobbyists to get laws passed to create these limitation of choices (mainly suing)?

Corporations and their allies.

We're all drifting from the point of this thread regarding the story of Saul Alinsky, an enemy of any civil discussion for the entire political spectrum.

Besides, I live in the area and those plants who shouted down Lloyd Doggett (D) of Austin were unlikely to be residents of his district. They weren't interested in listening or discussing. They just wanted to make a lot of noise since their side (the Republicans mainly) is out of ideas, hence why they're borrowing from Alinsky's playbook.

Steve, I'm in total agreement with you about corporate America... I was going for the "stereotypical" facetious liberal remark.

I'd say some good ole' sarcastic name calling is a step or two above the genuine sedition and incitement to violence exhibited by the KKK-wannabe-rebel retard who posted above. What a moron... and I truly enjoy calling a jackass a jackass, so save your conservative psuedo-sensitivity tripe to persuade a real bleeding heart not to speak frankly.

Steve - You misunderstand my position, but personally I have had no problem with my choices. Perhaps I am more fortunate than most, although my plan is a very standard one offered by one of, if not the largest insurer out there. I can say with certainty that there has NEVER been a government program that expanded choice. Trust me, when Petey and I agree it is something akin to a miracle. In fact I am so stunned it completely convinces me we are right on this issue. Right, Petey?

If I thought for a minute that private choice and a govt. program could coexist I would have less of a problem with it. But given the cost of the govt. program, along with the fact that it would be far more heavily populated with people from the bottom half of the economic ladder, who also have more health maintenance issues (pure statistics, so don't yell political incorrectness), the program will be unsustainable cost-wise unless they tax the hell out of us. So they won't allow these things to coexist for long.

As far as being out of ideas, I would rather have no ideas than really bad ones.

Thanks to people like Freedom Works (who are so Astroturfers and not all like the Boston tea party) I called up my senator and volunteered to go to any town hall he has - just to drown out the fake.

Yes, they're a**holes, but the only answer is to turn out to shut them up.

Or - let's take photos of them and post them and then we can name the lobbying organizations they work for.

Kenneth Gladney may well be the Atticus Finch of the second American revolution .... or does little miss Not A Chance think its acceptable that Obama’s SEIU thugs beat on protesters?

Further, the problem with Obama's health care reform isn't that we're so blessed by a heaven mandated, infallible-because-it's-American system, as these pebble heads would have it. Rather, Obama's mistake was to give up pursuing a government run single-payer system. The bill has become a fiasco, when anyone with a brain LARGER than a pebble knows single-payer is the only chance of getting a real fix. Our system is demonstrably the worst in the world on a cost/benefit analysis. Obama should have spent his political capital primarily on real health care reform, as our absurd health care system is the single largest threat to our economy, job creation, our standard of living, our health, etc., etc.,... and all of this directly determines the general decency we encounter in society, because the desperate can rarely live in dignity.

This is the lie being cooperatively dumped on Americans by conservatives and the media. Obama's poll numbers on health care aren't low because people don't want reform... they are low because people want real reform and Obama has given up on single-payer. If I were asked "How do you rate Obama's health care initiative?," I'd rate it low as well... but it wouldn't be because of a fratboy mentality that my side should win at any cost, regardless of how it really affects me and society.

Not a Chance seems to focus on brain size in many comments.

It lead me to a question for Not a Chance.

Did you read somewhere that Health Care will be rationed on the basis of brain size?

Matt W.

It lead me to question too... where pebble brain learn to type?

The notion that every one of these town hall meetings are being over run by radicals is just preposterous. I am an independent, and I am very concerned about the shape of the so-called health care legislation: Particularly, when you consider that the legislation is over 1000 pages, and, by their own admission, most legislators have not read the bill. When you throw in the facts around Congress spending $550 million for new jets; millions of dollars for congressional travel; pay raises for all congressional staff, etc, and when the president says that we all have to sacrifice, I think people have a right to question this legislation, and more importantly, their legislators.

I hope Mr. Lizza went further back than Mr. Aliinsky.

To Jim from Denver: Have you added up all the blogs that have posted Right Action's directions? + all the radio & TV stations that Rush & Beck are on?

I'm sure there are people who want to disagree with the Health Plan that doesn't exist yet, but wouldn't they want to go & discuss that? That's different from a shout down sometimes fronted by folks who have turned out to be from the GOP. Dissent is fine, but let's discuss the issue - everyone has health & everyone loses health.

Crooks & Liars has this history lesson.

Today's%20history%20lesson:%20How%20the%20Brownshirts%20used%20street%20violence%20as%20martyrdom%20propaganda%20%7C%20Crooks%20and%20Liars.webarchive

After listening to your show today, I think you have it all wrong. These astroturf demonstrators owe much more to Josef Goebbels than Saul Alinsky.

Easily the worst news item I've ever heard on NPR. A total whitewash of right-wing thuggery. Bob Garfield asks if what the right is doing is really "astroturf" or genuine, and he gets Orwellian dust thrown in his face twice, with one interviewee saying it doesn't really matter while another says that what these conservative, big-money-backed thugs are doing is no different from any other organizing. "On the Media" joins the rest of the lazy mainstream press by confusing "balance" with actual reporting.

Hmm. I read all the comments following my question about left-wing shout-down thuggery, and the only example was...the Weathermen/SDS? 40 years ago?

Answers my Q, dunnit?

There's a point in this discussion that everyone - including OTM - has completely missed.

The tactics and strategies developed and promoted by Alinsky were for the benefit of those who are otherwise powerless in the American political system. Community organizers generally work with people who are poor, live in underserved neighborhoods, are minorities, who are not property owners, etc. People who are shut off from power in our system, or who advocate things that the rich and powerful don't want, often NEED to use some kind of guerrilla tactics to be heard.

It's a disgusting irony that the powerful in our country - the for-profit insurance industry and their allies - are now using these tactics, as they see their total hegemony threatened by ideas that will work to the benefit of regular people, not the rich.

You don't have to "pay" these people who are going to the town halls and disrupting the democratic process (although there ARE insurance industry folks showing up at these things). You simply throw out horrible lies about the reform proposals ("Obama's gonna kill Granny! Obama's gonna take away your current plan!"), have your allies Rush Limbaugh and the folks at the Fox Comedy Channel repeat these lies 24/7, and next thing you know you have a gaggle of easily manipulated "regular folks" doing your work for you.

Claire - just to be clear, I wasn't responding to you, but to the person that said the left never used violence to protest. That was why I brought up SDS and Weathermen. Just as I don't like a lack of civil discussion regarding this health care plan (which I feel very confident in saying no one posting on here has read, since neither has your Congressperson) and the gross misinformation being promulgated by these interest groups, I also don't like it being made to look like the left never does the same thing. They CONSTANTLY did the same thing when the Republicans (old style, not these new idiots) would propose fiscal restraint or the cutting back of programs that were not working, putting on commercials that made it sound like they wanted to kick seniors out onto the street and the like. And goodness knows that liberal organizations have had their share of organized shout-downs and horrific name calling. Both sides are equally guilty of political zealotry when it is their ox being gored, and their ability to hold onto power being threatened. It just never seems like it when you agree with the side doing it.

Claire - just as a follow-up, it took 15 minutes of Google searching to find literally dozens of examples of liberal interests shouting down conservative speakers. Try it sometime. For example, Washington State University actually tried to muzzle the production of a play that had a conservative, even offensive (to some) viewpoint, then gave tickets to a group of black students whom they encouraged to disrupt the production. Ann Coulter (no, I don't like her either but that is not the point) has been shouted down numerous times, unable to finish her talk. And there are dozens more, but I guess you are right. The liberals are tolerant and open to the view point of all, and believe to their core that all have the right to express their views without harassment.

I'm not entirely convinced "The Passion of the Musical" is best described as having "a conservative" viewpoint. Is the scene with Mary Magdalene singing about how she just fucked Jesus (to the tune of the Star Spangled Banner) really reflective of present-day conservative thinking? If so, I can see why they're so annoyed with the mainstream medium misrepresenting their positions.

David, perhaps you should have spent a few more minutes doing your in-depth research and followed the trail to

spike.com

Do a search for the title there; a video of the entire show is on line. The terrible disruption is at the start of the second clip. It's hard to understand the words at the end of the first clip, so it's not entirely clear what they're "offended" by.

Your examples are no more truthful or useful than the rest of the right wing's disgusting babble.

There was one glaring omission in your report on the disruptions of townhall meetings, and your comparison with leftwing agitators like Saul Alinsky -- the agitators on the left do not represent people or groups with large sums of money and/or political power, like the mix of corporate money and rightwing craziness that is mixing together by Freedomworks and other groups that are seeking to harness the fears, resentments and paranoia of the religious right and white nationalists.

I don't want to be an alarmist about it, but what I am seeing in the corporate oligarchs decision to try to stir up mobs to fight on behalf of health insurance and pharmaceutical companies, is the beginnings of a fascist movement.

it is important to point out that the accountability sessions of Saul Alinsky were not meant to hold politicians accountable their constituents. Instead the accountability sessions were meant to hold politicians to the left wing redistributionist political program favored by. Alinsky it is a shame the Lizza and Garfield didn't get around to exploring the important question of accountability to whom or what.

Similar tactics are also found in the 1983 CIA Contra "Propaganda" Manual. It seems Mr. Lizza decided only to cite one source instead of more sources.

The pdf link for NYT Contra Manual of 1983 (1984 Cong. Hearing): http://www.freewebs.com/moeial/CIA's%20Psychological%20Operations%20in%20Guerrilla%20W

Why not a selection of sources? Guerrilla warfare is at least as old as "conventional" warfare.

The sad thing is these people don't have a clue how badly they're screwing themselves and the rest of the country.

They're simply stuffed full of contempt because they're losing the culture war, and because they have absolutely no conservative leadership with a clue about how to solve a single problem or how to broaden their ranks in the least.

Thus, out of desperation, they've latched onto this cynical, desperate last hope that they can somehow win back some of America by ensuring that any Democratic attempts at solving the country's problems fail utterly.

This is such incredibly selfish, anti-social behavior as to border on maniacal delusion. It places all of these poor slobs in the same camp as racial supremacists in terms of the approach to solving their grievances. The whole thing truly is Fascist, in some of the word's clearest connotations. I'd not have such an extreme interpretation if these people had even an inkling of an idea about how to better the issue they've embraced (health care). I'm now certain these fanatics have no real conviction whatever about the issue, but simply use it as a platform for their intolerance.

This is really scary stuff, yet the truly insane thing would be to back down from fighting this stupidity in the least. If terror-mongering by a handful of extremists is allowed to win sway in national politics, then we might as well be Iran or Somalia.

With all due respect, Ryan Lizza’s comment that the “funding doesn’t matter” demonstrates that he doesn’t understand in the least what is going on with the healthcare protests. It is all about the money. Private health insurers and pharmaceutical companies contribute millions of dollars to Congress to protect their “right” to protect their profits instead of the health of US citizens. Right-wing demagogues and PACs like FreedomWorks receive rich rewards for promoting disinformation, propaganda, and outright lies to scare the “low-information” public. Bob Garfield should have pressed Adam Brandon harder to reveal from whom FreedomWorks gets its corporate funding.

THE PROBLEM: Let’s focus on the problem--nearly 50 million US citizens are now without ANY healthcare coverage, and more are added each day as they lose their jobs or private insurers arbitrarily decide to drop them from coverage. The lack of insurance is creating huge financial losses for US hospitals because uninsured people go to emergency rooms instead of their physician of choice. Some hospitals have closed their ERs to avoid going bankrupt. Rising health insurance premiums for employers are causing the US to be less competitive in the world market.

A SOLUTION: A sensible solution is to offer basic medical coverage to all who cannot afford private insurance, just as every other industrialized country does.Which is what President Obama is proposed--a health insurance “exchange” where a person can either keep their current private insurance, switch to another private insurer if they choose, or purchase less-expensive public health insurance. Medicare will remain an option for those over 65. To any rational person this would seem like a sensible solution--if you can’t afford private health insurance, you can buy it through a government plan (just like Congress does).

But somehow the right-wing demagogues like Limbaugh and Hannity have twisted and distorted this reasonable proposal with a pack of lies, scaring senior citizens that they can no longer have Medicare, or even that they will be euthanized.

- Limbaugh and Hannity are intelligent men--why would they promote such falsehoods?

- Why does FreedomWatch promote disruptive tactics reminiscent of Hitler’s SA “storm troopers” who would disrupt political meetings and shout down political rivals in the 1920’s?

THE MYSTERY OF THE PROTESTS

Here’s question one needs to ask to unravel the mystery behind this riddle--

WHO PROFITS?

Let’s start with those who have a vested interest in making big profits from sick people- pharmaceutical companies, private health insurers, and legislators:

- Pharmaceutical companies typically have a profit margin of over 50%. How convenient that Congress has already guaranteed the pharmaceutical companies’ profits by removing drug discounts from the draft of the healthcare bill.

- Private health insurers have around 22% overhead, while public insurance plans (like Medicare) have overhead of around 3%.

Where does that overhead go? Mainly to insurance company executives and stockholders.

Until 2006, the CEO of Aetna was earning $241 MILLION a year! He received golden parachute of $1.1 BILLION when he was forced to resign due to financial hanky-panky.

- Both Congresspersons and Senators of both parties accept millions of dollars from these corporations every year--check out www.opensecrets.org Politicians & Elections » 2008 Overview » Stats at a Glance to see just who in Washington is getting the big pay-offs. Here’s a hint- just about everyone.

It is indeed unfortunate that Bob Garfield did not press the very urbane (and evasive) Adam Brandon of FreedomWorks on just who is funding his organization’s highly-organized rabble-rousing.

It’s all about the money.

- Dave

Your report was an appalling piece of "journalism", based entirely on theory, speculation, and MSM conventional wisdom.

Did On the Media...

a) actually have reporters in attendance these townhalls/protests?

b) interview anyone in these "mobs"?

c) do a tiniest bit of research about where these people are finding out about these townhalls, getting their information?

I've attended two of these townhall meetings in St. Louis and can tell you and others in the MSM (including Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow) you're 100% wrong.

1) these people aren't getting their marching orders from the healthcare industry or Republican/conservative organizations like the one you mentioned

2) these people are finding out about the townhalls from local talk radio (not hannity or limbaugh) and local bloggers such as gatewaypundit.blogspot.com and http://stlouisteaparty.com/

3) The majority of people attending are older - most politicians are scheduling these townhall meetings during work hours, and I hate to break this to you...most conservatives actually work. If you want to see some massive protests at these townhalls, tell our representatives to schedule their meetings after work hours or weekends.

4) The vast majority of these people never attended a townhall meeting or protest until this year

Your program demonstrated the intellectual laziness found throughout the MSM. Do burn any shoe leather, just pick up a meme from your fellow liberal colleagues and run with it. I requires a lot less effort and fits in nicely with your liberal world view.

Yes,

let's just keep pouring half our health care dollars into insurance companies so that a few individual a-holes like the Aetna CEO above can earn 241 million a year and Get paid 1.1 billion dollars golden parachutes.

That's a much better way to spend the public's money than putting it into a national health care system.

-And meanwhile, we can accept higher premiums and denial of coverage to ensure that these CEOs don't make a little less next year.

The worst thing about the report was the conflating Alinsky with the Democrats. The meme seems to be that the far left engaged in disruptive tactics in the 60's so the Republican Party is justified in spreading misinformation and disrupting meetings 50 years later.

I'm old enough to remember Saul Alinsky; he spoke and held some workshops at my Alma Mater in the mid-60's. He was no Liberal. In fact he reserved major contempt for Liberals, and his protests disrupted mainly Democratic politicians. He was way out of the mainstream, as were the SDS and particularly the Weathermen. The tactics he used were disgusting and anti-democratic then, and they are disgusting and anti-democratic now. The model of these disruptors harkens back to the Brownshirts of the 30's. It was Fascist when the new left used it in the 60's, it is Fascist when the Republicans use it now.

Protest is a method. It is neither right nor wrong. The anti-health care protests are wrong because:

1- Their facts are wrong

2- They are directly organized and financiallly supportedby the people that benfit by denying them medical care.

3- This is a critically important and complicated issue. We need thought and debate. All this screaming does not make for a better bill.

The republican party is quickly turning into a collection of Boobs, Biggots and Birthers. We could use a real debate on health care. We cannot afford the current system any longer.

Whoever came up with that report gets an "F."

Driving home from another grueling shift in the ER where I've been a doc for over 25 years and listening to this whacky report made me seriously question Bob Garfield's judgement and motives.

Please explain which major corporations or wealthy individuals were behind the "Left" referred to in the report. I've lived through campus shutdowns and bombs going off and nobody thought of these as representing the liberal movement that fought to end the Vietnam war or nuclear arms race. The Alinsky types were fascists interested in control and power, and nobody I know appreciated their tactics. To hell with them all.

Those of us who see the desperate need to reform our sick health care non-system need to get better organized -- fast. Drown out those idiots, and shame on OTM for giving them an open mic.

I was disappointed with the quality of this story. Framing the discussion with the Alinsky movement completely misunderstood Alinsky and the uses of IAF tactics. The fundamental and HUGE points it missed were, first, that Alinsky developed his approach to give a voice to the powerless in their own economic and social destinies, and second, that Alinsky's campaigns were NEVER based upon lies. The corporate powers that are funding not the protesters themselves but the dozen or so groups that are organizing the protests are the embodiment of the kind of power that Alinsky was fighting. Who in the world could be surprised that they are using those tactics now? But OTM should have dug deeper and not accepted the propaganda spewed by the Freedom Works spokesman. And OTM should have highlighted the substance of the "protests" and pointed out the fact that they are all spewing lies about the proposed healthcare reform. NOTHING those protesters are saying is based on any truth about the proposals.

This was a sloppy story. One, why didn't you ask the freedom fries guy where their money comes from - you had the perfect opening. Are they funded by Republicans and corporate lobbyists or not? Second, no follow up on letting the Party of No define "astroturf." Saul Alinsky told people without money and power how to get noticed. Is it equivalent when the people who have the money and power use these tactics to keep it and keep a legitimate discussion from taking place? This was a really lazy piece and I'm disappointed in OTM for putting it out.

Where did Mr. Lizza post his "research?" I couldn't find it on The New Yorker site. Are we dealing w/ mere heresay?

For top drawer info on Health Care Reform, see the primer articles & links on Slate & for proposed bill comparisons go to the Kaiser Family FDN site for full info: www.kff.org. + current news & fact-checking.

After reading through the comments a couple of times, it appears that Keith Olberman's Special Kommnets are driving most of the regurgitated talking points seen above. So much for Saul Alinsky.

So you can't protest when you're not completely impoverished? If I recall correctly, Bill Ayers was supported by Dad, a well known corporate fat cat.

And Alinsky's campaigns were based upon whatever people could fit on a poster board.

One bit of irony reported on our local NPR station, KWMU, today--a right-wing protester who was injured at the Carnahan Town Meeting is asking for donations to help pay his medical bills. Seems he lost his medical insurance when he was laid off.

Why not call corporate-run, profit-driven "health insurance" what it really is: PAY OR DIE. What makes THAT any different than getting mugged by a "protection" racket?

The protests of right-wing radicals against health care represents the changing direction that is taking place in this country and they are being left behind. I have found their protests to be counter productive because it will simply backfire on them within the 24/7 news cycle.

It would be nice if your commentators would take this issue a bit more seriously. Alinsky's tactics were political theatre, of course, but anyone who has read Alinsky's work should understand that the tactics and methods were simply means to a more just and equitable society. Alinsky was fighting for desegregated neighborhoods in Chicago's toughest neighborhoods in the 1930s and he continued to fight for racial justice throughout his life. It's the centennial of Alinsky's birth in 2009. Let's take his legacy a bit more seriously. Read the first chapter of _Reveille for Radicals_, and you'll find out what Alinsky was really about.

There are so many crazy things about this whole discussion of health care. I don't understand why no one mentions the obvious:

1. This health care problem has been looming for over 30 years. NOTHING was stopping the insurance companies and the doctors from solving this problem without government intervention. Why didn't they? (cha-ching) Instead, they just made it worse and worse ...

2. This is totally linked to the financial crisis, especially for the U.S. car companies. Cars made in Japan are made by workers who have their insurance covered by the government.

3. Senior citizens already have universal health care paid for primarily by the government! Holy smokes - they need to sit down and be quiet! I'm almost a senior citizen, by the way ...

4. Universal health care has the potential to free up jobs for younger workers. There are many people my age who are vested at their place of employment, but can't leave because their employer covers their health care. That is something that sure keeps me sitting at my desk. I would love to do something else, but I can't afford to go without health care coverage.

These are the things that make me want to scream out and these "protests" where sensible discourse becomes impossible are ridiculous. If I were to go to one of these meetings, I am sure I would leave in disgust.

These slimeballs don't even know what they're protesting against as no finished bill yet exists, and certainly not a single one of these pea-brains has read even a line of the proposed House bill.

That is precisely why they have to make up moronic lies... there's nothing tangible from the world of reality for them to take issue with.

These "protests" are 100 percent due to unamerican idiots who can't live with with our country's legitimate election results.

Not a Chance,

Still the obsession with brain size. Get over it. I emailed Linda Douglas at the White House and She assured me that Health Care will not be rationed on the basis of brain size. It is surely will be some other factor.

I think we all know now what other factor Not a Chance is worried will be used to ration health care.

Demonizing the protesters when you can't debate the topic on the merits is a typically pathetic move by the ill-informed.

All said and done, I am disappointed that the legitimate rage of citizens at these town meetings has been spurred not by the legacy of Hurricane Katrina and the continuing outrage of New Orleans but the lies spread about health insurance reform. Still, it should be recalled that Congress has been held in contempt by the public on a par with that of the last Administration for a lot longer than that Administration largely due to the public's keen awareness that our welfare has historically been bought and sold several times over by it as an institution.

The wrong idea that Congress did actually buy their new fleet of private jets reminds me, once more, of the Senator at the car company bail-out hearing comparing the company execs flying in on separate private jets to the felow who goes to "the soup kitchen in top hat and tails!" Now, I am well enough to retell it.

I knew that man. Philip Salem was his name and he came from New Haven, the scion of one of the old families known as the "Proprietors of the Green", our town square.

According to him, he had been the Touring Director of the New York City Ballet and, earlier, as a dancer he would be rehearsing a role in, say, Paris and would lunch at the local soup kitchen wherever he could find one without changing from the top-hatted, tailed character he portrayed. He said visiting with the clients of a soup kitchen gave one a true feel for the pulse of a society.

As I met him, while he squatted in abandoned dance studios in New Haven late in his foreshortened life at our soup kitchen, there was an elegant authenticity to his tale. At the time, he daily offered counsel to the far less educated about the vast array of services offered, if only one had the skills to negotiate the hurdles. A far cry from car company execs begging top hat in hand or Congress rewarding itself, wouldn't you say?

Oh, yeah. To bring it back around to Alinsky and Barack's health insurance reform, as I've reported here, I met Michelle and Barack (sort of) while working for an Alinsky-based community organizing program, as a support staffer not an organizer, and I actually voiced strong reservations about the Alinsky model.

In the long run, I'd rather be remembered as New Haven's one-time Mayoral candidate who ate at the soup kitchen every day than as a guy who helped the Obamas manipulate a bunch of senior citizens into storming the headquarters of HHS to propel their careers. The opposition could do the latter just as easily. Let them try the former, top hat & tails or not.

While rereading this, still on my screen after I lunched on the Community Action Agency Elderly Nutrition Program meal at my senior and disabled housing project, my neighbor stopped by to get a witness' signature and borrow a stamp to complete and mail his Dept. of Social Service benefit redetermination and I explained to him that he needed neither, especially as the envelope was emblazoned, "No stamp necessary if mailed in the United States."

It's not a question of ability to think, it's a question of willingness.

[Argument - Tangency]

I’ve come to the point where blogging is more an act of personal motivation than expectation of dialog or social refinement. My tunnel vision pursuit to describe, design, and develop a forum to bring democracy to an intelligent argument causes the interjection of tangent discussion into many blogs. I’m no longer going to apologize for this. I blame it on the forum. Blogs do not facilitate intelligent discussion. Heresy rules, the focus is short lived, and the problem is lost in the mix. The same can be said about recent town hall meetings.

You can’t force a point of view. You can only guide it from the clarity of your perspective. The Do Good Gauge describes a formula to give citizens a better chance of being heard. Coherency and respect are instrumental to the formula. The freedom of speech does not provide a freedom to be heard. Screaming or the threat of violence does not provide motivation for anyone to listen.

Like it or not, everyone has a point of view. Some points of view are just plain bad. I’m not ashamed to admit that my own erroneous perspective has been swayed by respectful individuals with more knowledge than myself. When a point of view is foggy, it is up to an individual to change direction or clarify his or her position.

One of many premises of the Do Good Gauge is to allow an argument to be developed by an individual or like thinking group. The continuous refinement and feedback of an argument provides the means to clarify a point of view and/or steer the argument in a more optimal direction.

I worry about the fate of citizens when hate, fear, ignorance, and chaos becomes the most effective methods for political change. Respect, coherency, and community should be given equal opportunity.

Then again, we could just set on the couch and allow the media to dictate our opinion.

The Do Good Gauge

http://wow.dogoodgauge.org

I am done with NPR after listening to this shameful piece. NPR has become just another mouthpiece for the lunatic rightwing bigots who want nothing more than to stifle this country and drag it back into the dark ages. Never have I been so ashamed to have given money to NPR. I hope you're happy NPR, you've really alienated a lot of people, and a whole lot of core listeners.

Good riddance NPR. You've stopped repeating my own point of view and so I'm outta here. How can I reinforce my own myopic view of the world when you don't cater to me. Bill Moyers here I come.

These paranoid delusional people on the far right are very dangerous.

Quotes, like this one above, are direct incitements to violence: “We use our words now and move on to more drastic measures later.” Plenty of these people are just the kinds of fringe nutcases who might be just neanderthal enough to carry out violent retribution… You know, Timothy McVeigh style.

I’ve seen several posts where some of these psychotics claim Americans are losing their rights; asked to name a single right they’ve supposedly lost, they come up empty headed (handed).

Some of these people are textbook delusional, having constructed an enemy of “The Other” in their minds, for which they literally have to fabricate grievances, since no legitimate ones actually exist in the real world.

If this handful of fringe extremists are allowed to dictate policy based on a few tantrums, then America is in real trouble.

These people are from the ranks of hardcore Bushies. These are the same people who stuck us with the leadership, failed policies, and world view which resulted in all of today’s greatest crises.

They are all the angrier for having thought they had a strangle hold on american politics that would last for decades, only to wake up and realize they’d already lost the culture war and middle America.

These hard-liners are so insulated by having surrounded themselves with fringe elements, that they actually believe their views represent a majority in America.

We all have reason to fear the awful spectrum of intolerance and consequence of action that these extremists represent, but we can take heart in one certainty… “You Tube” and common sense will ensure that the bizarro viewpoints of the far-right are pushed ever further from the center of the american political arena.

A few extremists in Iran didn’t like the legitimate results of their country’s election either… That is the road the intolerance of these extremists would take us down.

Not a Chance,

You should add more derogatory terms to your posts. They make you sound so smart and connected to the policy issues.

Sincerely,

Ad Hominem

Obama's sheep have no souls much less freewill. Look at Not a Chance, she's goosestepping right in tune with her leader. Vichy had a lot of sheep as well, look what she got. Baa

If you are low-income in America you pay less in taxes than you get from the Government. You *ARE* on the Government payroll and to pretend to be unmotivated by your recipient of the Government teat is dishonest.