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Some can't reconcile what they believe about the propaganda that is fed to them with their own positive experiences with public programs like Medicare. As the health care discussion has descended from contentious to surreal, there is perhaps one message that encapsulates better than any other the incoherence of those expressions of rage seen at town hall meetings across the country: "Keep government out of my Medicare!" The rallying cry has been heard again and again as lawmakers have returned home to discuss health reform during the summer recess. In South Carolina, an enraged constituent told Republican Rep. Bob Inglis to "keep your government hands off my Medicare!"; a woman reportedly sent a letter to the White House stating in no uncertain terms, "I don't want government-run health care, I don't want socialized medicine and don't touch my Medicare." Slate's Timothy Noah put out an open invitation for readers to submit more examples of this kind of confusion. The incoherence isn't limited to the low-information rubes turning out at town halls either. Supply-side, "voodoo economist" Arthur Laffer cautioned during a recent interview on CNN, "If you like the post office and the Department of Motor Vehicles, and you think they're run well, just wait till you see Medicare, Medicaid and health care done by the government." And in a wildly convoluted interview on Fox News this week, RNC Chairman Michael Steele argued simultaneously that Medicare is an inefficient, deeply flawed program that must be protected at all costs. http://www.alternet.org/healthwellness/142174/town_hall_lunacy_includes_outraged_calls_to_%27keep_government_out_of_medicare%2C%27_when_medicare_is_government/
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(13 of 13)
Re: Town Hall Lunacy Includes Outraged Calls to 'Keep Government Out of Medicar
Sep 4, 2009 2:53 PM
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Everyone needs to read about the "Diamond" technique that is being used by those wanting Obama's health care reform effort to fail.
http://www.eagleforum.org/educate/1998/nov98/focus.html
A friend shared a document with me that prescribes methods for counteracting this manipulation. I pass this on for everyone's benefit:
1) Never, NEVER lose your temper! Lose your temper and lose the battle, it is that simple! Smile, if it kills you to do so. Be courteous at all times. Speak in a normal tone of voice.
2) Stay focused! Always write your question or statement down in advance to help you remember the exact manner in which your question or statement was made. These agents are trained to twist things to make anyone not acceding to THEIR agenda look silly or aggressive. Smile, wait till the change agent gets done speaking and then bring them back to your question. If they distort what you said, simply remind those in
the group that what he or she is saying is NOT what you asked or said and then repeat, verbatim, from
your notes the original objection.
3) Be persistent! Wait through any harangues and then repeat the original question.
4) DON'T go alone! Get as many friends or relatives who think as you do, to go along with you to the meeting. Have each person "armed" with questions or
statements which all generally support your central viewpoint.
5) DON'T sit together as a group! Spread out through the audience so that your group does not seem to be a group. When the facilitator or change agent avoids answering YOUR question and insists that he must move on so everyone may have a chance to speak, your own agents in the audience can then ask questions, worded differently, but still with the same meaning as yours. They can bring the discussion back to your original point. They could even point out, in a friendly manner, that the agent did NOT really answer
your question. The more the agent avoids your question, and the more your friends bring that to the attention of the group, the more the audience will shift in your favor.
To quote my informant: "Turn the technique back on them and isolate the change
agent as the kook. I've done it and seen steam come out of the ears of those power brokers in the wings who are trying to shove something down the citizen's throats. And it's so much fun to watch the moderator squirm and lose his cool, all while trying to keep a smile on his face."
Now that you understand how meetings are manipulated, let's show them up for the charlatans which they are.
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(12 of 13)
Re: Town Hall Lunacy Includes Outraged Calls to 'Keep Government Out of Medicar
Aug 31, 2009 3:14 PM
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I just used this old thread. This mess was over health care.
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2/7/09
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(11 of 13)
Re: Town Hall Lunacy Includes Outraged Calls to 'Keep Government Out of Medicar
Aug 31, 2009 3:11 PM
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Oh wait government is already involved with medicare... OMG !
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1
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8/28/09
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(8 of 13)
Re: Town Hall Lunacy Includes Outraged Calls to 'Keep Government Out of Medicar
Aug 28, 2009 4:04 PM
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It's not only the un- and under-educated who are mad about this topic. My sister-in-law, who is a very knowledgeable person (most of the time), wants the government out of the health care business - and she's 70 and has been receiving medicare benefits for 5 years now! Sigh! I tried to explain it to her, but it's an uphill battle. She actually believes what the right wing mouthpieces on the radio have to say. She's not as cynical as I am.
She also believes in the free market economy but wants farm subsidies to stay! It seems that a lot of people want the government to get out of evryone's life, except when the government money directly or indirectly affects them. Double standard, business as usual.
A long time ago, I took a class in high school called current events. We had to actually READ the newspaper and bring in articles of interest to discuss in class. I wasn't too fond of the class then, but it taught me to understand what was being said by the forked tongues (politicians) when they gave interviews. It has helped me to cut through the piles of bull that spew from their mouths as easily as saying hello.
I'm from New Jersey, so I'm inured to crooked politics and two-faced politicians. Notice that I didn't say I'm used to politicians being crooks, but here it's all we have. I refer to the 2 major parties as the Democrooks and the Republicrooks. We badly need a viable third party, but we can't seem to cut past the apathy in NJ. Maybe we're the Garden State because of all the manure being spread statewide by our politicos!
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(7 of 13)
Re: Town Hall Lunacy Includes Outraged Calls to 'Keep Government Out of Medicar
Aug 28, 2009 2:51 PM
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Griz,
Don't get it, first you say folks are stupid, and now they're not? Take a stand dude.
And let me be the first to say that when the newly organized leftybots get to town halls, they'll be similarly challenged, and will provide the world with a pleathora of interesting sound bytes to choose from.
I harken back to the election, and after winning a primary, a local news station interviewed an obviously drunk participant, who ranted at the top of her very generous lungs, Obama's gonna pay my car and my house.
Well, if she bought a Kia last month, it's about half a car, but unfortunately, because Barney jacked up the mortgage relief act so badly, I fear her mortgage went unpaid........
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Posts:
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(6 of 13)
Re: Town Hall Lunacy Includes Outraged Calls to 'Keep Government Out of Medicar
Aug 28, 2009 2:15 PM
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I'll agree with you that e-mail is making snail mail obsolete. There will come a time when snail mail goes the way of the dodo.
E-mail is not cheap. Even if you are on a "free" service like G-Mail or Yahoo, you get bombarded by advertiser that pay for the service. If you pay for e-mail service, you have that fee plus the advertisers.
When people used to write letters, they took time and thought out exactly what they wanted to say. With e-mail, people zip out whatever is on their minds, regardless of spelling and grammar. Plus the ever popular mistakes.
Back to the point of the thread, I don't necessarily think the people you claim I am berating are uneducated. I think they are being driven by passions that if they sat and thought about it, they could come up with effective arguments. We live in the world of the sound-bite and that's not a good thing IMHO.
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Posts:
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(5 of 13)
Re: Town Hall Lunacy Includes Outraged Calls to 'Keep Government Out of Medicar
Aug 28, 2009 1:57 PM
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Griz
I really don't think you're characterization is correct. I'm not aware of anyone who believes medicair is a private function.
Second, I can send an email to you that will follow you around the planet for vitually nothing. You're telling me that the Post Office will only deliver to one location, and it costs astronomically more than email? Sounds pretty damn efficient to me.......
You sound exactly like how you characterize the folks you want to berate. Uneducated, and sad.
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(4 of 13)
Re: Town Hall Lunacy Includes Outraged Calls to 'Keep Government Out of Medicar
Aug 28, 2009 1:49 PM
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What's really sad is that the people saying it actually believe Medicare is privately run.
And there's all this hooplah about how ineffectual the Post Office is. You pay less than 50 cents and they'll deliver a letter anywhere is the country usually within 5 days. Not only that, they'll usually deliver directly to your home. Sounds ineffectual to me.
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(3 of 13)
Re: Town Hall Lunacy Includes Outraged Calls to 'Keep Government Out of Medicar
Aug 28, 2009 1:44 PM
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Several things pop to mind here.....
First, I would suggest that most folks are scared shitless that government is going to CHANGE the way medicare works. I'd also contend that most folks believe, rightly, that the system they paid their entire adult lives into isn't as much a social program but a service government promised they'd manage. \
There are several problems with this. Obama, for one, has said that one of his goals is to end the medicare advantage program. For the folks who've paid into these plans, the obvious fear is that their care will cost them more, they won't be able to continue care levels they currently have, or that they simply won't be able to retain their current comfort.
While the articulation may not be the best from some of the folks who've made these concerns public in these town halls, the concerns are still more than valid.
Instead of addressing the real issue, which is that medicare is grossly mismanaged, fails to contain any cost either to itself or the consumer, and acts independently as the catalyst for cost increases, this administration has chosen to market that as a success story, and something that the rest of the non medicare recipients should envy.
In terms of what "voodoo economics" you care to call out, one could just as easily point directly at the President's own language and ask the question how government run health care would have no impact on government spending. Cost savings from where? I about snorted coke out my nose the night Obama likened it to the post office. Aren't they the folks losing 10 BILLION dollars a year and are unable to compete with UPS or Fed Ex, even though they are statutorially protected from competition? How should that analogy provide anyone comfort?
What I find incoherent is what democrats ultimately want. I frankly don't think they know. Unfortunately, it's the disjointed message and the competing democratic priorities, more than anything else, that is the real road block. Example, Obama uses the statistic of 50 million folks uninsured. Of which, there are approx 12-13 million who are illegal immigrants. He's on record as having said that health care should cover everybody, including illegals, and half his own party disagree with him. Obama historically favors single payer, although he's been vague enough recently that some may think he's including coops.... most of his party are against anything that doesn't include single payer.
Here's the deal, I as an employer offer health care coverage to my employees because I have to. If I didn't, market fould take all my good candidates away to other companies. I take that on as a cost of business. I do that because the labor market I hire in is very competitive.
The expectation, though, should be that folks actually work for their coverage. There are certainly folks who don't have the ability to work for medical reasons, and I don't have problem one with providing a safety net either through my support of things like United way, or religious hospitals, etc or the state I live in providing medicaid or having Social Security pick up some of these costs.
Second, perhaps the democratic congressional folks should get their stories or their explanations straight before they get out in public and embarrasst he crap out of themselves. So many examples. Is it too much for them to actually read the bill the Apollo folks wrote for them?
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(2 of 13)
Re: Town Hall Lunacy Includes Outraged Calls to 'Keep Government Out of Medicar
Aug 28, 2009 12:30 PM
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And keep bread out of toast too dammit!
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256
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(1 of 13)
Town Hall Lunacy Includes Outraged Calls to 'Keep Government Out of Medicar
Aug 28, 2009 12:18 PM
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Some can't reconcile what they believe about the propaganda that is fed to them with their own positive experiences with public programs like Medicare.
As the health care discussion has descended from contentious to surreal, there is perhaps one message that encapsulates better than any other the incoherence of those expressions of rage seen at town hall meetings across the country: "Keep government out of my Medicare!"
The rallying cry has been heard again and again as lawmakers have returned home to discuss health reform during the summer recess.
In South Carolina, an enraged constituent told Republican Rep. Bob Inglis to "keep your government hands off my Medicare!"; a woman reportedly sent a letter to the White House stating in no uncertain terms, "I don't want government-run health care, I don't want socialized medicine and don't touch my Medicare." Slate's Timothy Noah put out an open invitation for readers to submit more examples of this kind of confusion.
The incoherence isn't limited to the low-information rubes turning out at town halls either. Supply-side, "voodoo economist" Arthur Laffer cautioned during a recent interview on CNN, "If you like the post office and the Department of Motor Vehicles, and you think they're run well, just wait till you see Medicare, Medicaid and health care done by the government." And in a wildly convoluted interview on Fox News this week, RNC Chairman Michael Steele argued simultaneously that Medicare is an inefficient, deeply flawed program that must be protected at all costs.
http://www.alternet.org/healthwellness/142174/town_hall_lunacy_includes_outraged_calls_to_%27keep_government_out_of_medicare%2C%27_when_medicare_is_government/
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