HealthCare Town Halls - A Revolution of the Misinformed?

I had seen the images on TV, town halls being taken over by anti-health reform zealots shouting down their local representatives, and shouting a mix of personal scepticism, misinterpreted facts, and regurgitated lies.




So I decided I would go to my own Congressman's town hall, New Jersey Congressional Representative Steve Rothman. He's been holding a series of "Listening Tour" events throughout Bergen and Hudson Counties, and I figured I'd see for myself if there was really a groundswell of opposition as conservatives would have us believe...





The place was full, about 150+ people in Palisades Park. Rothman and his team organized the town hall well, getting questions on paper in advance and calling on individuals to ask their questions. For the most part the town hall was civil, and people were not very tolerant of people who spoke out of turn. There was a general consensus that everyone was going to behave. It lasted from 7pm till 9:30pm, afterwards Rothman met people in the street and listened to their questions. What I found there was really interesting.



The issues that came up were numerous, but the take aways from the people attending were such:



A deep distrust of politicians, and apparently, of the Obama administration. There were many times that people mentioned a distrust of Congress and that there was something that was being hidden in the bill, or that parts of the bill were being mis represented to appease the crowd. There was a mention of patient's personal information being abused by the government, despite the fact that the govt currently protects personal information from being abused by insurance companies now. One person's comment "The real problem is that there is one person up there who wants to take over the world..." Who might this be????

Continued anger over stimulus and TARP. Whenever these topics were brought up the detractors in the meeting would go ape. At one point Rothman tried to make the case that the stimulus was showing signs of working, and that was when there was very loud jeering and drowning him out. They did not want to hear that TARP was neccesary, or that the stimulus was anything but a waste of their money.

A belief that at some level, illegal immigration is behind this. There was a man who tried to make the case that up to 30 Million of the 47 million of uninsured were either illegals or families of illegals (and therefore apparently not deserving). The loudest applause came after a commenter demanded Rothman take a hard stance on immigration. To his credit, Rothman stated his stance was clear - prevention, enforcement, and a path to citizenship.


The impression that health care reform is a zero-sum game, that if other people get it, what they have will somehow disappear, or that their insurance companies will not be able to compete and eventually die out, leaving the only choice to be the government option.


That abortion will be paid for with government dollars


That doctors will be incentivized into talking people into having living wills (AKA the "kill your grandma/death panel theory")


I scanned the room and many of the people there had what looked like print outs of talking points from the internet. One man tried to read what he claimed was actual verbage from the bill illustrating his point that the bill was socialist "On page so-and-so it says..." but wasn't allowed to speak out of turn. When I looked at his paper from a few feet away, it wasn't the bill at all, it was a 3 page bullet pointed sheet of apparent "excerpts" from the bill with commentary.

When I hear descriptions of the other town halls, I hear the same questions, fears, and scenarios.
The fear of the people seemed real, the sceptism definitely did, but the information which seem to be fueling this fear and sceptism was suspect at least, and I couldn't shake the feeling that some it it was purposely misleading to incite the negative reaction from apparently normally rational and understanding people.


Those who were close to the front lines within healthcare also got to speak. A couple of nurses, a woman trying to get approval for her medical procedures, a young teacher who never had healthcare until recently. They all seemed to come to the meeting with personal stories, and personal questions, and basic support for the initiative. But those who seemed to spend their time fear mongering, all had the same points, the same type of disaster scenarios, even some of the same rebuttal arguments you've been hearing at other places, so much so it was very hard to believe that the info they were getting wasn't from the same place.


A bit disturbing was the lack of real voice from those who wanted healthcare reform. There were a few people there, some with shirts, buttons, a woman with a sign she printed from an Obama website. But for some reason they didn't get to the mike as much. Now I assume that this was an exercise in "squeaky wheel," but it seemed as though the supporters were quietly waiting their turn while the detractors spent a lot of time reiterating each other's points. The longest speeches were diatribes about government takeover, illegal aliens, and leaving "my coverage alone..." while those who were asking about clarification points, or showing support had short turns. Again, no overtalking, no booing (well except for at Rothman), but the loudest applause lines went to those who were making points that seemed to come from a set of "facts" they all had read beforehand.


Even more disturbing was a conversation I heard between two people after the town hall was over. They had both expressed their opinions earlier at the meeting. They were just outside when I was walking towards them and I stopped to wait and see what would happen when Rothman joined the crowd outside. They quickly stopped talking, though I never spoke in the meeting and no one knew my political affiliation. But before they did, the woman told this to her comrade:


"We need to take this country back....They made have had a coup, but this is a revolution..."