Angry Mob of Racist Extremists Beats Black Man at Town Hall Meeting

Say it ain't so, Joe!


At a town meeting held by a Democrat congressman, a raucous group of organized and angry thugs showed up to make a point about ObamaCare, and then suddenly beat up one black man by a white man yelling racial slurs.

Kenneth Gladney, a 38-year-old conservative activist from St. Louis, said he was attacked by some of those arrested as he handed out yellow flags with “Don’t tread on me” printed on them. He spoke to the Post-Dispatch from the emergency room of the St. John’s Mercy Medical Center, where he said he was waiting to be treated for injuries to his knee, back, elbow, shoulder and face that he suffered in the attack. Gladney, who is black, said one of his attackers, also a black man, used a racial slur against him before the attack started.

“It just seems there’s no freedom of speech without being attacked,” he said.

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Six people, including P-D reporter, arrested at Carnahan meeting - STLtoday.com

Indeed, how ironic. A bunch of SIEU thugs in purple shirts going after a black man just because he wanted to sell yellow "Don't Tread on Me" flags? Unreal. And now the guy is considering suing 4 of those who physically attacked him by beating him up in the face, in the back of the head, and while he was on the ground got kicked, etc. Got called a n****r. Tsk tsk...and guess who are the real mobs now?

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PtDRx3h8JJA]YouTube - Black Conservative Kenneth Gladney Attacked, Called Racial Slur at St Louis Health Care Town Hall[/ame]

We got an angry white man!

netrox said:

We got an angry white man!

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In the article, both parties are black.

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTXBOgPCh9w[/ame]

A transcript with discriptions...

He also said he was not paid or asked to be at the event or to start any trouble.

In the video, a black man in a tan polo shirt (Gladney) is clearly being picked up and pulled to the ground by a much larger white man wearing the signature purple SEIU t-shirt 05).

A black man and a white man, both wearing SEIU t-shirts walk away from the melee after other protesters bring attention to it, and call for police. The black SEIU member, rubbing his shoulder, says at one point, "He pushed me," as protesters accuse him of attacking the man in the tan shirt. The black SEIU guy sounds like he's looking for his "keys," but I can't be sure. In the background, the white SEIU guy is in a verbal argument with someone in a white polo who says, "You attacked him. You're going to jail!," which elicits and "F*** you" from the white SEIU guy.

When Gladney is brought back over to the scene, this time with an escort, he yells, "Where are my glasses?" at which point the black SEIU guy seems to hand something over to him, but it's obscured.

"What the hell is wrong with y'all?" Gladney exclaims. "Why'd you hit me? Did I bother you?" (0:43)

The camera then pans back to the man in the white polo and the white SEIU guy:

"You attacked that guy for nothing," says white polo.

"No, we didn't attack him for nothing," SEUI guy replied, adding something I can't understand. 53)

As the camera pans back over to a bewildered Gladney and surrounding witnesses, you can hear White Polo say, "Two of you attacked that poor guy."

SEIU: "No, we didn't."

White Polo: "Yeah, you did!"

SEIU: "He attacked America!" (1:01)

At around 1:25, the person filming asks Gladney what happened.

Gladney: "That guy attacked me."

Cameraman: "Which guy?"

Gladney: "The black guy, there."

Cameraman: "Why?"

Gladney: "I don't know. I was standing there, you saw me. You saw me, I'm standing here selling my flags."

He flags down a cop car, at which point the rest of the video is of police cuffing a protesting white woman (not sure what her role was) and the white SEIU guy, who protests that he didn't attack Gladney; he was simply removing him from his fellow SEIU member. The police are also detaining White Polo, but don't cuff him or anything in the video.

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The Weekly Standard

Angry? Just amused on how dumb these SEIU guys are. Guess who the real thugs are. A bunch of racists one, too.

So, you condone the attacking, Netrox?

tsk tsk...

shel90 said:

In the article, both parties are black.

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No, black and white. That is, the SEIU thugs.

shel90 said:

In the article, both parties are black.

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Does not matter. The implied meaning is that Liberals beat down a black man, nothing more. What else would you expect from our resident Conservative Lighthouse? A beacon in the darkness of the Obama administration. Leave no stone unturned in his quest to bitch and moan for the next 41 loooooooonnnnnnnggggg months.

saywhatkid said:

Does not matter. The implied meaning is that Liberals beat down a black man, nothing more. What else would you expect from our resident Conservative Lighthouse? A beacon in the darkness of the Obama administration. Leave no stone unturned in his quest to bitch and moan for the next 41 loooooooonnnnnnnggggg months.

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I am getting sick of all the hatred against Obama..I dont think I ever remember a president get so much hate like that. Wow.

So, you're condoning the attack on a black man by a white man then? Or any attack from both black and/or white?

shel90 said:

I am getting sick of all the hatred against Obama..I dont think I ever remember a president get so much hate like that. Wow.

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Not hate. Just that I see him as unqualified and inexperienced who doesn't really know what he's doing. I'm sure he's a cool guy to hang around for a beer drink or two and play bit of pick-up basketball. But to be intellectually dishonest as a president, not good.

kokonut said:

Not hate. Just that I see him as unqualified and inexperienced who doesn't really know what he's doing. I'm sure he's a cool guy to hang around for a beer drink or two and play bit of pick-up basketball. But to be intellectually dishonest as a president, not good.

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I am not just only referring to AD but out there too. It is amazing...

shel90 said:

I am getting sick of all the hatred against Obama..I dont think I ever remember a president get so much hate like that. Wow.

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I do. His name was Bush.

bush hate - Google Images

Anger toward the President is one thing and totally justified right now considering the way he's handling health care and smearing protesters who oppose him as astroturfers. But irrational unhinged hatred is uncalled for.

darkdog said:

I do. His name was Bush.

bush hate - Google Images

Anger toward the President is one thing and totally justified right now considering the way he's handling health care and smearing protesters who oppose him as astroturfers. But irrational unhinged hatred is uncalled for.

Click to expand...

Maybe I never paid attention to politics before but now that I am a teacher, I am paying more attention to it and whoa!!! The hatred!!! Damn!

The protests at town hall meetings on health care reform continue to get louder and more violent.

One event in Tampa, Florida, got particularly ugly… with hecklers and people pushing and shoving. As the Democratic congresswoman addressed the crowd — people chanted “read the bill” and “tyranny.”

Hundreds couldn’t even get into the meeting — as demonstrators on both side of the debate shouted at one other.

In St. Louis — there are reports that six people were arrested after health care protests broke out at what was supposed to be a forum on aging held by a Democratic congressman.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was even at the center of about 200 protesters in Denver where she was visiting a homeless clinic. The crowd was loud, but orderly — about half supported the reform and half opposed it.

Pelosi and other Democrats insist these protests at meetings sponsored by Democrats won’t derail health care reform once Congress gets back to work next month. Democrats have been accusing Republicans and special interest groups of orchestrating many of these demonstrations. Some liberal groups have started sending their own supporters detailed instructions on how to counter what they called organized disruptions.

Republicans insist the opposition is legitimate and coming from the people. Conservative groups are telling their supporters where to find upcoming town hall meetings. They’re sending them confrontational questions to ask members of Congress… and chants and slogans to use when they get there.

Here’s my question to you: Will increasingly loud and violent town hall protests succeed in killing health care reform?

Cafferty File: Tell Jack how you really feel Blog Archive - Will loud & violent town hall protests kill health care reform? - Blogs from CNN.com

At scattered events across the United States, protesters are confronting members of Congress whose summer "town hall" meetings aim to get a sense of how Americans feel about overhauling healthcare.

Boiling Springs in South Carolina -- population 4,500 -- was true to its name on Thursday, giving U.S. Representative Bob Inglis a taste of rising anger among conservative voters toward President Barack Obama's reform plan.

Several conservative groups are engaged in efforts to encourage their members to attend town halls. Conservative organizations opposed to health care reform -- including FreedomWorks, Americans for Prosperity, and Conservatives for Patients' Rights -- are conducting a campaign to turn out their supporters to attend those events. CPR has reportedly "confirmed that it has undertaken a concerted effort to get people out to the town hall meetings to protest reform," while FreedomWorks and Americans for Prosperity have reportedly "organized" the town hall protestors and are "harnessing social networking Web sites to organize their supporters in much the same way Mr. Obama did during his election campaign." [Greg Sargent, The Plum Line, 8/4/09; The New York Times, 8/3/09]

America's Health Insurance Plans reportedly deploying employees to "track[] where local lawmakers hold town-hall meetings," "rebut" Democrats. On July 30, The Wall Street Journal reported: "nsurers continue to wage an aggressive campaign against Democrats' proposals to create a public health-insurance plan. America's Health Insurance Plans has stationed employees in 30 states who are tracking where local lawmakers hold town-hall meetings." And on August 5, the paper reported: "The health-insurance industry said Tuesday it is launching an effort to send insurance-company employees to public meetings nationwide this month to rebut increasing criticism of the industry from the White House and top Democrats." [The Wall Street Journal; 7/30/09, 8/5/09]

AP reported on town hall disruptions, ignored conservative strategy | Media Matters for America

A group called the Tea Party protesters -- named for the Boston tax revolt that helped spark the American Revolution -- has launched a campaign to disrupt Democratic town hall meetings on healthcare.

In Boiling Springs, Inglis was repeatedly interrupted when he said government could in some cases play a positive role in people's lives -- a sign that conservative anger could potentially threaten some Republicans as well as Democrats.

"Fear is driving people to the extremes," he said. "Tonight we had people that are very fearful about President Obama and very distrustful of him as a person and his agenda."


Angry Americans Disrupt Town-Hall Healthcare Talks - ABC News


Fox News follows up "tea party" promotion with promotion of town hall disruptions. Just as it promoted the April 15 "tea party" protests, Fox News is now promoting the disruptions of Democratic town hall events by protesters opposed to health care reform, protests that are being touted by Republican leaders and supported by conservative groups. Following the August 2 disruption of a town hall event hosted by Sen. Arlen Specter (D-PA) and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, Fox News personalities -- including Sean Hannity, Peter Johnson, Gretchen Carlson, Steve Doocy, and Neil Cavuto -- have lauded such protesters or urged viewers to take similar action.

Conservative media birthers also pushing town hall disruptions. Conservative media figures who have promoted conspiracy theories about President Obama's birth certificate -- including Lou Dobbs, Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, and Jim Quinn -- have recently used their radio shows to promote the anti-health care reform disruptions of congressional town hall events. Indeed, the disruptions resemble similar efforts by birthers to disrupt town halls.

Media echo serial misinformer McCaughey's false end-of-life counseling claim. Since former New York Lt. Gov. Betsy McCaughey falsely claimed that the House health care reform bill would "absolutely require" end-of-life counseling for seniors "that will tell them how to end their life sooner," numerous media figures have echoed McCaughey's claim -- even after the falsehood was debunked and McCaughey herself backtracked.

AP reported on town hall disruptions, ignored conservative strategy | Media Matters for America

By tradition, town-hall meetings are sedate, boring, sparsely attended affairs. Now large, hostile crowds of voters give their guy in Washington an earful about government run amok. Videos of embattled lawmakers are posted on YouTube, and the meetings are turning into events that resemble last April’s Tea Party protests. The targets are mostly Democrats in districts where a majority of voters are more conservative than Democratic leaders in Washington—many of these districts voted for John McCain or George W. Bush in recent presidential elections.

Max Schulz: A Town Hall Protest in Maryland - WSJ.com

The phenomenon appears to spring from a couple of conservative websites that have urged followers to attend staff office hours for Sen. Jeanne Shaheen - the usual turf for one-on-one constituent meetings in which a veteran might seek help getting benefits or a dad might ask for his child to be nominated to West Point - which some sites have advertised as health care town halls. One website, for the New Hampshire Tea Party Coalition, urged folks to go to meetings in Hampstead and Grafton to ask questions about "government takeover of health care."

Concord Monitor - Protesters disrupt 'town hall'

AFL-CIO Vice President Rich Trumka added his own angry blast. The thugs infiltrating the town hall meetings of U.S. Senators and Representatives during the current Congressional recess are “corporate-funded mobs…sent by their corporate lobbyist bankrollers to disrupt.” He added, “Mob rule is not democracy. We call on the insurance companies, the lobbyists, and the Republican leaders who are cheering them on to halt these ‘Brooks Brothers’ riots. Health care is a crucial issue and everyone, on all sides, has the right to be heard.”

During the August recess, many members of Congress will be holding town hall meetings with constituents to discuss current issues, particularly health care reform. Usually sedate affairs, these meetings are being disrupted by organized right wing extremists who try to shout down Democratic officials conducting the meetings and constituents asking questions in attempts to prevent a civil dialogue and intelligent debate.

Organized by such groups as the Tea Party Patriots and backed by insurance interests and conservative ideologues, their strategy, according to their own memos, is to rattle and intimidate Democratic officials in an attempt to hijack the meetings and prevent health care reform. Their tactics include turning up in large numbers at town hall meetings, spreading themselves around the venue to appear to be a larger proportion of the audience than they are, attempting to drown out any viewpoint they disagree with, and spreading lies about the health care reform bills currently before Congress.

Along the way, Rep. Tim Bishop (D-NY) had to leave a meeting with a police escort for his own safety and has suspended town hall meetings, Rep. Frank Kratavil (D-MD) was hanged in effigy, and Rep. Brad Miller (D-NC) suspended town hall meetings after receiving a death threat over health care reform. Other targeted members of Congress include Sens. Carl Levin (D-MI), Arlen Specter (D-PA) and Claire McCaskill (D-MO), and Reps. Gary Peters (D-MI), Lloyd Doggett (D-TX), Dan Maffei (D-NY), Patrick Murphy (D-PA), Allen Boyd (D-FL), Thomas Perriello (D-VA), Bruce Braley (D-IA) and Russ Carnahan (D-MO).

As a matter of freedom of speech, anyone is entitled to express their viewpoints, no matter how dishonest or misguided they may be. But trying to prevent others from expressing their views violates the freedom of speech of people with whom they disagree, and shows a fascist mentality on the part of the right wing meeting disrupters. What is even more disgusting is that this un-American strategy has been endorsed by House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) and Republican Congressional Committee Chairman Pete Sessions (R-TX). We can only wonder if Boehner and Sessions have ever heard of the First Amendment.

In response, progressive groups have organized to attend town hall meetings en masse to offer support for the Democratic officials under attack and maintain order. Health care reform is a major issue and subject to a wide variety of disagreements. But right wing attempts to prevent a civil dialogue by trying to shout down views they disagree with only demonstrates the weakness of their arguments.

Disrupting congressional town hall meetings shows a fascist mentality

This mob, sent by the local Republican and Libertarian parties, did not come just to be heard, but to deny others the right to be heard. And this appears to be part of a coordinated, nationwide effort. What could be more appropriate for the “party of no” than having its stalwarts drowning out the voices of their neighbors by screaming “just say no!” Their fanatical insistence on repealing Social Security and Medicare is not just about halting health care reform but rolling back 75 years of progress. I am more committed than ever to win approval of legislation to offer more individual choice to access affordable health care. An effective public plan is essential to achieve that goal.

Disrupting town-hall meetings: latest GOP tactic Later On


Since members of Congress have been returning home to their districts for the August recess, a consortium of industry-backed right-wing groups have been planning ambushes to harass Democrats for supporting health care reform. ThinkProgress obtained a leaked memo from a volunteer with Tea Party Patriots, a website sponsored by lobbyist-run groups Americans for Prosperity and FreedomWorks, that details how members should be disrupting town halls and “rattling” Democratic members of Congress.

Last night, Rep. Steve Kagen (D-WI) and Rep. Steve Driehaus (D-OH) were apparently the latest victims of this strategy. Kagen, whose town hall was targeted by the Wisconsin chapter of Americans for Prosperity, was “repeatedly disrupted” by “incomprehensible” shrieks and shouts from angry conservatives.

Think Progress More ‘Town Halls Gone Wild’: Angry Far Right Protesters Disrupt Events With ‘Incomprehensible’ Yelling


These guidelines for conservative activists from Right Principles  -Unapologetically American- detail how to pack and disrupt a local town hall sponsored by a Democratic member of Congress. The tactics have been employed aggressively in recent days across the country conservative activists and their allies protest the healthcare overhaul bill in Congress.

Anti-Reform Group Takes Credit For Helping Gin Up Town Hall Rallies
Conservatives for Patients’ Rights, the operation that’s running a national campaign against a public health care option, is now publicly taking credit for helping gin up the sometimes-rowdy outbursts targeting House Dems at town hall meetings around the country, raising questions about their spontaneity.

CPR is the group headed by controversial former hospitals exec Rick Scott that’s spending millions on ads attacking reform in all sorts of lurid ways, a campaign that’s being handled by the same P.R. mavens behind the Swift Boat Vets.

“The more you dig the more you learn that this is a carefully orchestrated effort by special interest lobbyists and the Republican Party, who are using fringe elements on the right to protect insurance company profits and defeat health care reform,” said House Dem leadership aide Doug Thornell. “The anger at these events looks very similar to what we saw at McCain/Palin rallies in the fall.”

Anti-Reform Group Takes Credit For Helping Gin Up Town Hall Rallies | The Plum Line

How to disrupt a town hall meeting - Boston.com

Insurance company lobbyists, Fox News and conservative Republican talk show hosts have been prompting people to attend and disrupt town hall meetings put on by Democratic Congressmen in order to discuss the creation of an option of public health insurance. A memo produced by these interests details how to best disrupt the meetings. Some Republican Senators have even condoned these tactics, claiming this behavior is a form of free speech.

Newsvine - Is preventing the free speech of others by disrupting town hall meetings a valid form of free speech?

Rep. Steve Kagen was shouted down by protesters at events he held over the past week in his home state of Wisconsin. Democratic Sen. Arlen Specter and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius also faced boos from opponents at a town hall meeting Sunday in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

"I think that a fair amount of the activity was orchestrated. I think a fair amount of it was involved individuals who came without being orchestrated. But it was a battleground," Specter told The Associated Press.

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said Tuesday that he thinks the anger some of the congressmen have experienced is manufactured.

"In fact, I think you've had groups today, Conservatives for Patients Rights, that have bragged about organizing and manufacturing that anger," he said Tuesday.

The Democratic National Committee released a Web video Wednesday charging that Republican operatives "have no plan for moving our country forward, so they've called out the mob."

The video shows footage of angry constituents and protesters at recent events and then flashes pictures of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, House Minority Leader John Boehner, Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele, and even conservative talk radio icon Rush Limbaugh on the screen.

Democrats say Republicans staging town hall protests - CNN.com


Conservative teabaggers openly disrupted a town hall meeting tonight in the 1st Congressional District hosted by Congressman Steve Driehaus. The group, using the educational forum as their own shouting session, apparently booed and mocked the Congressman, hijacked the event agenda, and forced their status quo agenda down the throats of people who were there to actually hear what Driehaus had to say.

According to a conservative blog covering the event :

"I would say the ratio of those opposed to ObamaCare and single-payer ran about 8-to-1 (maybe more). In fact, when the "public option" was raised and people yelled that would destroy competition, one of the Obamatons screamed, "the public option is competition!". The guy next to me erupted, "No, it's MARXISM!"

Classy people, these teabaggers. For all the talk about taking away liberties (an issue most them suddenly discovered on January 20th), they have a strange way of expressing free speech - by suppressing the voices of others.

Teabaggers Hijack Driehaus Congressional Town Hall | OhioDaily

Some of the activists who've shown up at town hall meetings held recently by Sen. Arlen Specter, D-Pa., Rep. Steve Kagen, D-Wis., and others are affiliated with loosely connected right-leaning groups, including Conservatives for Patients' Rights and Americans for Prosperity, according to officials at those groups. Some of the activists say they came together during the "Tea Party" anti-big-government protests that happened earlier this year, and they've formed small groups and stayed in touch over e-mail, Facebook and in other ways.

But they insist they're part of a ground-level movement that represents real frustration with government spending and growth.

"There isn't any group that's backing me, who's influenced me, who's pushing me to do this," said Robert A. Mitchell, a small-business owner from Doylestown, Pa., who questioned Specter at a weekend town hall event about lawmakers failing to read legislation.

The exchange was captured on YouTube and has spread, along with other videos. One showing protesters mobbing Rep. Lloyd Doggett, D-Texas, includes footage of someone holding a sign showing Doggett with devil's horns; another shows Kagen shouted down at a forum at a library.

Mitchell said he was angered by push-back from the White House and it would motivate him to further activism, a view echoed by others.

"These are town hall meetings, and the federal government is trying to intimidate people," Mitchell said in a phone interview Wednesday.

Republican Party Chairman Michael Steele defended the activism, even as he denied the party was organizing it.

"

Democrats accuse conservative groups of organizing activists to disrupt health-care forums - cleveland.com

Health Insurance / Medical Insurance News Useful Links



News organizations continue to cover contentious town hall meetings.

NPR: "Many of the events this week appear to have been organized by conservative groups. A new Web site is called 'Operation Embarrass Your Congressman.' A widely circulated memo tells right-wing protesters how to treat their representative: 'Make him uneasy... stand up and shout out, and sit right back down... rattle him.'" The man who wrote the memo belongs to the conservative group Tea Party Patriots.

Lawmakers Face Angry Constituents In Town Hall Meetings.

This event is the result of several fanatical conservative groups’ attempt to spread hatred and misinformation, intentionally organizing for no other reason than to disrupt town hall meetings and try to incite people to fear and emotional reactivity. If anyone is responsible for what happened to the man in the article he posted, it is these conservative fanatics. Violence is exactly what they intend to provoke.

darkdog said:

I do. His name was Bush.

bush hate - Google Images

Anger toward the President is one thing and totally justified right now considering the way he's handling health care and smearing protesters who oppose him as astroturfers. But irrational unhinged hatred is uncalled for.

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Indeed. Obama is having it easy.

As a former Insurance Company employee...

You know what just kills me? People screaming about Washington bureaucrats making medical decisions for them (when nothing could be further from the truth) while they completely ignore the fact that someone with a high school diploma sitting behind a computer screen that has absolutely no medical training or education at all is already doing that. They are called insurance company employees. Insurance companies decide every day whether or not they think a person should have a medical procedure, they tell you whether or not you can see a specialist, they decide how much they will pay for a procedure no matter what the actual fee is, they second guess doctors’ diagnoses and treatment plans and decide whether the doctor can treat you in the way that he feels is best for your health, they refuse to cover anything they consider to be a “pre-exisiting condition”, they refuse to pay for procedures that were medically necessary, and they tell you what doctor you can and cannot see. And the whole purpose of it is to do nothing more than increase profits for the big insurance companies. These people have already turned all of their decisions over to an insurance executive that is concerned about only one thing…how much profit their company will make this year, and how they can refuse to pay for necessary treatment in order to increase those profits. Insurance companies can refuse to insure any person they choose to. They can charge you exhorbitant fees for insurance. The vast majority of people pay more in premiums during their lifetime than they would ever pay for medical care. They drive up costs by only paying a percentage of their allowable, not a percentage of the actual fee. Doctors, by and large, have to eat those differences, and then raise their rates to make up for it. Insurance companies are the ones that have Americans by the balls. That is exactly why they are lobbying against health care reform. Reform will take control away from them. They will no longer be able to deny care for a pre-existing condition. Because all Americans will be insured, doctors and hospitals will no longer have to write off millions of dollars every year for providing care to the uninsured, or those insured under HMOs or PPOs that pay a small percentage of costs, and leave the doctor and the hospital to count the rest as a loss.

People just don’t think things all the way through. They don’t bother to even read their insurance policies. They turn a blind eye to the fact that insurance company employees dictate what medical care they can and cannot receive. It’s completely absurd.

shel90 said:

This event is the result of several fanatical conservative groups’ attempt to spread hatred and misinformation, intentionally organizing for no other reason than to disrupt town hall meetings and try to incite people to fear and emotional reactivity. If anyone is responsible for what happened to the man in the article he posted, it is these conservative fanatics. Violence is exactly what they intend to provoke.

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And yet you provide zero evidence that their intent was to provoke violence. So some union thugs attack him for exercising his first amendment rights, but it's not their fault- it's the fault of the guys you disagree with. Do I have that right?

shel90 said:

You know what just kills me? People screaming about Washington bureaucrats making medical decisions for them (when nothing could be further from the truth) while they completely ignore the fact that someone with a high school diploma sitting behind a computer screen that has absolutely no medical training or education at all is already doing that.They are called insurance company employees. Insurance companies decide every day whether or not they think a person should have a medical procedure, they tell you whether or not you can see a specialist, they decide how much they will pay for a procedure no matter what the actual fee is, they second guess doctors’ diagnoses and treatment plans and decide whether the doctor can treat you in the way that he feels is best for your health, they refuse to cover anything they consider to be a “pre-exisiting condition”, they refuse to pay for procedures that were medically necessary, and they tell you what doctor you can and cannot see. And the whole purpose of it is to do nothing more than increase profits for the big insurance companies. These people have already turned all of their decisions over to an insurance executive that is concerned about only one thing…how much profit their company will make this year, and how they can refuse to pay for necessary treatment in order to increase those profits. Insurance companies can refuse to insure any person they choose to. They can charge you exhorbitant fees for insurance. The vast majority of people pay more in premiums during their lifetime than they would ever pay for medical care. They drive up costs by only paying a percentage of their allowable, not a percentage of the actual fee. Doctors, by and large, have to eat those differences, and then raise their rates to make up for it. Insurance companies are the ones that have Americans by the balls. That is exactly why they are lobbying against health care reform. Reform will take control away from them. They will no longer be able to deny care for a pre-existing condition. Because all Americans will be insured, doctors and hospitals will no longer have to write off millions of dollars every year for providing care to the uninsured, or those insured under HMOs or PPOs that pay a small percentage of costs, and leave the doctor and the hospital to count the rest as a loss.

People just don’t think things all the way through. They don’t bother to even read their insurance policies. They turn a blind eye to the fact that insurance company employees dictate what medical care they can and cannot receive. It’s completely absurd.

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There's a big difference. Ultimately, insurance companies can't piss off too many customers or health care providers if they want to retain them, attract new ones, and maintain a good reputation. They have that competitive pressure. Government bureaucrats, on the other hand, are not exactly a paragon of accountability.

And of course it's true, as you said, that "the vast majority of people pay more in premiums during their lifetime than they would ever pay for medical care." It has to be that way. If insurance companies did not bring in more money in premiums than they spent on medical claims, they would go bankrupt. The point of insurance is to mitigate risk- to gain peace of mind by protecting against things that are unlikely, but devastating should they happen. Also, if companies decided to take people after they got sick, everyone would just wait to get sick before buying health insurance instead of paying premiums while they're healthy. That's like getting in a car wreck, calling up the car insurance company, and saying "yeah, I just got in a wreck, so I need coverage now."

Also, people should read their insurance policies and know what coverage they're buying. If they don't, that's their own fault.

We're already heading in a dangerous direction financially. We simply cannot afford this bill. It will only exacerbate an already bad situation. There are things that we can do that will not make us broke, will actually make health care less costly, will not destroy innovation, and will not incur long wait times.

There will always be people who fall through the cracks. For that, I have a simple solution: private charity. Donate time, money, whatever. Granted, it's not terribly popular with "progressives", but I much prefer that over forcefully taking money and running it through inefficient bureaucracies.

netrox said:

We got an angry white man!

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Reading Comprehension FAIL!

Yiz

Which is why you have a choice such as Health Savings Account which is ideal for those who are in good health and not old. It's a way to control your own money and still be insured for catastrophic health situations. You pay a high deductible for that while everything else such as medical check-ups, broken bones, etc. are the kind that can be paid out via your own HSA or out of your own money.

A modest proposal: Let your Health Savings Account make you money