Recent Town Hall Meetings

thankfully i see no headlines lately about the protestors showing up at town halls, probably because there haven't been town halls this week. it really annoys me that so many of these hooligans have been given air time. one woman compared barack obama to hitler. c'mon people. barney frank said it best when he responded to her "having an argument with you would be like arguing with a dining room table." those individuals were clearly not interested in having a constructive debate about how to fix a seriously dysfunctional system. shouting things like "death panels" and "pulling the plug on grandma" i think served to get them on the news that night, but there's been quite a robust campaign in response to get the facts out and dispell some of the ridiculous outright lies about the reform bills.

regarding the issue of more higher paying jobs, i'm all for that but i don't think it'll fix healthcare. i have a well-paying job but my insurance deductible is $3700. my mother in law had a decent paying job with a university but her employer wouldn't offer her benefits and considered her a limited term employee for 5 years!

now, i am a big old lefty but i get very frustrated that no politicians are talking about how our lifestyles cost billions of dollars in healthcare annually. obesity is responsible for 2/3 of chronic preventable diseases per the CDC.

but there are multiple factors contributing to the problem and the system has basically been in the hands of the free market for quite some time. clearly it's not the answer.