N.C. Dem's Death Threat Over Health Care

Congressman Receives Threat from "Instigator" Protesting Obama Plan, as Town Hall Disruptions, Provocations Continue

(AP)  A North Carolina congressman who supports an overhaul of the health care system had his life threatened, as increasingly raucous protests are greeting pro-reform lawmakers at town hall meetings across the country.

Democratic Rep. Brad Miller received the death threat in a phone call Monday, one of hundreds the congressman's office has fielded demanding town-hall meetings on the health care proposal, said his spokeswoman, LuAnn Canipe.

She said the callers were "trying to instigate town halls so they can show up and disrupt."

Democratic lawmakers expected protests and demonstrations as they headed back to their states and districts over the August recess to sell health care reform legislation.

Earlier this week, White House officials counseled Democratic senators on coping with disruptions at public events this summer.

In the week since the House began its break, several town-hall meetings have already been disrupted by noisy demonstrators (including this Tampa town hall which devolved into shoving matches and catcalls).

On Friday, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin chimed in, calling President Barack Obama's health plan "downright evil" in her first online comments since leaving office.

She said in a Facebook posting that he would create a "death panel" that would deny care to the neediest Americans.

"The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama's 'death panel' so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgment of their 'level of productivity in society,' whether they are worthy of health care," the former Republican vice-presidential candidate wrote.

Obama, a Democrat, campaigned on a promise of offering affordable health care to all Americans, as the United States is the only developed nation that does not have a comprehensive national health care plan for all its citizens.

He has proposed a system that would include government and private insurers. Republicans say that private insurers would be unable to compete, leaving the country with only a government-run health program. They warn that could leave Americans with little control over their health care.

The protests have drawn widespread media attention, and Republicans have seized on them as well as polls showing a decline in support for Obama and his agenda as evidence that public support is lacking for his signature legislation.

Pushing back, Democrats have accused Republicans of sanctioning mob tactics, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid accused protesters earlier this week of trying to sabotage the democratic process.

[endurorob]

So according to Reid protests are and attempt to sabotage the democratic process? I don't know what America helives in but in the America I live in protests are an important part of the democratic process.

[midlclass]

Alot of republican't ranting and raving about a socialized health care. i believe that if they would stop there fear monering and look at whats being put together. they would have a better understanding. I've heard Obama say time and time again that if you like your ins you can keep it. You don't have to have a goverment plan. that would be an option for people who don't have any ins. you know the self employed guy who has diabetis, and no ins company will touch him because of a pre exsisting condition. or the people who work for a company that decides it can't nafford to pay for it's employee health ins. but can dish out thousands and millions for Executve salaries and bonuses, and then have people going out to fight for these ignorant's. let the republican't have mores have more and screw the rest. keep it up another reason so we can't do something and then sit there and whine about congress not doing anything. come up with a better plan. I feel that when my employer has to pay 1/2 a million a year for 45 employee's that the ins. issue is out of control and if it takes a single payer option to straighten out these guys go for it

[bradkt1]

So this bunch of nuts is what the GOP has come to. Wow...that's really sad...and what's worse is that GOP leaders are encouraging this.

This is why the GOP will be soundly trounced in 2010 and in 2012. No bunch of shrill, lying yahoos is going to get anywhere in the political process in this country...especially those who think that they can just shout down anyone that they disagree with. That's not how it works in the United States of America.

[velma179]

Health care reform will pass this year.

[thusspokezara]

All this talk about Democrats trying to push for euthanasia in order to cut down on health care cost is a big lie. Just because Democrats are not willing to protect life at its BEGINNING does not mean that they are not willing to protect life at its END.

[democracy1]

Yeah, the "euthanasia" lie.

The part of the bill that deals with your right to establish a "Living Will" (which has already been in existence in this country for over 2 decades) that was inserted by 2 Republicans.

And Sister Sarah fell for the lie, hook, line and sinker--what an idiot! No one can stand up for her now without truly looking like a fool and she did it to herself!

[alanrobisch]

ithink you miss a basic fact that in most cxountries with single payer systems end of life treatment is limited because it is deemed no to be cost effective. At present about 25% of the money spent is spent on end of life treatment. It may not represent euthanansia but it is limiting the options of people at the end of life to chose.

The pro-choice party seems to have decided that if it costs too much money choices shouldn't be given.

[ubrew12]

I dare you to find a private insurance company that will insure you past the age of 65. That's why Medicare had to be developed. So, I don't see how promoting private insurance because it doesn't care whether you break them financially at the end of your life is the right solution. Of course they care, its expensive. That's the truth whether you have public insurance or private insurance.

[nottellin1]

Statistics state that healthcare for 46% is already publicly paid via Medicare, Medicaid and other programs, so we already have a public option. So if there is something so wrong with our current government run public programs, why would anyone agree to the new expanded government run public program? The real solution is to open free clinic's for those without insurance and mandate that they use them. They could even be attached to hospital emergency rooms so folks without insurance could be immediately referred there. Drs could be required to perform pro bono work there, staff paid by the gov. I don't understand why a possibly lazy person that doesn't work should be treated the same as someone that has worked diligently and achieved a level of professional development with an employer sponsored insurance plan.

My favorite line is ___% of Americans support some form of healthcare reform". Sure some form just not the form they are currently trying to foist on us. The only way the can come up with a double digit % is to use the phrase "some form", never "this health care reform". Are we spinning yet?

[robham777]

Clearly, the favorite tactic of conservatives. (It's easier than answering the truth with more BS and spin.)

Have you ever seen the Keith Olbermann show?

[robham777]

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/08/05/cash-strapped-alabama-county-feels-crush-recession/

I could not find a reference to the stimulus plan in this story. There may be an implication that recovery is still a long way off, but I don't think that even qualifies as news.

[hungry1968-16]

It was one of the "Talking Heads" shows - not actual news, just BS opinions.

The one "guest" asked what the mismanagement by county officials has to do with the stimulus plan, and they quickly ridiculed him and shouted him down.

Clearly, the favorite tactic of conservatives. (It's easier than answering the truth with more BS and spin.)

[robham777]

Sorry, I don't get the fox news channel and can only view their online content. I would argue that the best thing that has come from the stimulus plan is that it has enabled some state and local governments to forstall impending disaster, however this was not the advertised purpose of the bill.

[velma179]

rob...

You must have not been listening then...

A MAJOR concern in the original explanation of the stimulus package had to do with IMMEDIATE help to state and local governments.

It was and IS about stimulating the economy -- this is a broad range plan. Do you think state and local governments are not part of the economy?

[hungry1968-16]

Breaking news!!

According to the Fox News talking heads just now, Jefferson County Alabama has to raise taxes and cut services, due to fiscal mismanagement by the county's officials.

This is "proof" that the stimulus isn't working.

(??????)


(Don't ask me, it's their bizarre claim!)

[r9119111]

by fcs25 August 9, 2009 12:41 PM EDT
The outburst of average American citizens in these meetings show very clearly that the democrats have shot themselves in the foot ------

fcs25: These were not average Ammerican citizens. If you would like to find out who is behind this disruptive hooliganism, check the following site online:


Birthers, Teabaggers, and other assorted wachos

http://www.dakotapolitics.com/getForumPost.asp?ArticleId=416254

Posted on: Aug 5 2009 - by 37rye

This whole thing is orchestrated outrage designed to disrupt the democratic process and should be met with action on the part of the administration at once. It is pure hooliganism and should not be tolerated.

I used to be a party line voting Republican. What they are doing now is not my idea of patriotism and I shall never vote for them again as long as they are not willing to do what is best for America rather than their own selfish and very fraudulently deceptive agendas.

[jab232]

Neither party should call members of the other Nazis. We spent all of World War II killing Nazis. The term is an invitation to some deranged person to kill.

This applies especially when your high profile commentators apply it to a president of the United States.

There was a lot of unhappiness with George W. Bush, but I never saw heard of anyone who called him a Nazi. I'm sure there were a few deranged people somewhere who did, but not nearly to the extent the term is being used now.

Quit calling people Hitler and Nazis whichever side they are on.

[noloyalisti]

Idiot, mindless tea baggers. They remind me of the brown-shirts of the right wing Nazi Germany. The ones who said "I was only doing my job" or "I was only doing what I was told". They want to stay back when there were no civil and womens' rights. Not only no changes but go BACKWARDS.

If is was up to these blind loyalists, we would never have fought the Revolutionary War.

[robham777]

by noloyalisti August 9, 2009 2:33 PM EDT
I do agree with this. We the people, the 98%, should be ready to take down the top 2% who own more than 20% of the wealth of this country.

This is exactly the type of rhetoric that Nazi party would have used during it's ascension to power in Germany. The Nazi party was the "workers party" and was anti capitalist as well as racist.

[nottellin1]

You people have to get over your Republican vs Democrat ideology. Do you really know all your friends political parties and are they all really the same as yours so that you can truley say that everyone in the other party is evil. You sound like little children who aren't grown up enough to notice that none of our primary party leaders are representing any of their constiuants. DC has become another world of 'whats in it for me, screw everyone else". The problem is that our legislators have forgotten that it is 'we the poeple' not, me the politician'. Wake up and stop demonizing everyone that doesn't look, think, act and beleive exactly as you do. Or, you could move to a county that is not as free as we are in the US. If you want to live a different way than with the rights and principles that our constitution guarantees, move somewhere else!!!

[noloyalisti]

I do agree with this. We the people, the 98%, should be ready to take down the top 2% who own more than 20% of the wealth of this country.

We are literally in a class war in America and it is time we stopped fascism in its tracks like we did for Nazi Germany. As in this and other fascist countries the big corporations took over the media, the military and the Congress. Just like here.

Time to organize to shut it down. Let me know, you can find me on the blogs here. And the heck with the anti-freedom, blind patriot, fake Christians who hate change.

[ubrew12]

The wealthiest 1% of America has gone from owning 20% of the country, 30 years ago, to owning 40% of the country today. That is largely thanks to the Reagan and GW Bush tax cuts. I prefer the wealth distribution the U.S. had in the 1950's, when the wealthiest 10% of the country owned 55% of it, rather than the 75% of it they own now. Excess money in the hands of the very rich finds its way into legislation benefitting guess who, and usually penalizing the rest of us. Obama's healthcare reform is a classic example: the healthcare corporations will make out quite well, as the rest of us continue to pay twice as much as the rest of the world to the same healthcare.

But I don't believe in class war, its just not useful or even realistic. I believe in progressive taxation: a return to taxation levels that America used in the 1950's, back when this country was the greatest on earth, instead of the bankrupt corporatocracy Reagan turned it into (with lots of Democratic help).

[nearl451]

The violence of the Brown Shirters and the politics in fear is alive and well in the Republican ranks.

In 2010, the American people will again realize how fascist these tactics are and continue to marginalize these sociopaths and their thuggish dominions.

[jschmidt27]

Is that the same Brownshirt type action when the SEIU (Union) members roughed up some people who were trying to attend a meeting with their legislators? Or perhaps it was the Black Panther voter intimidation last November that Holder seemed fit to dropped the charges on?

[fcs25]

The outburst of average American citizens in these meetings show very clearly that the democrats have shot themselves in the foot and their days in congress are numbered.Come 2010 they will be "fired" and congress will become republican once again.Hurray!!!! Shoot yourselves again democrats and you'll be out of power for the next 20 yrs.

[veteran71]

If Wingnuts were actually permitted to design their own country based on their zany beliefs, it'd be a wasteland of toxic dumps near fume/smoke belching factories, where Multinational Corporations employ millions of slave workers who live in a shanty town in the adjacent swamp. There'd be round the clock fires manned by dying slaves, where the dead are scooped by Corporate Robotic Dozers, into huge vats, where they're stirred into a soup to feed the workers.
(And that's at Holiday Time, you don't want to hear about the regular work week).....

[velma179]

heheheheeeeeeeeeeeeee

[element51]

There is sure a lot of comment about this issue. The funny thing is that in the end the republicans will win. With leadership like Limbaugh and his followers there is no end to what they will do. I used to believe in America but in the last 30 years I have seen things that I would never have believed. Example: I was an Obama supporter and had a window sticker on my van. Just last week someone tore the sticker off and all four of my tires were slashed. In addition to the tires my windwhield was shattered. All because I was an Obama supporter. I never thought it would come to this but I am now frightened. I am afraid to express myself because of the fear of what will happen to me. I listen to the wild claims being made by republican leaders about "death panels" and such and I know they are outright lies but I am now afraid to voice my feelings. I am an old man and spend most of my life in a wheel chair so it would be hard to defend myself. I believe that the best thing for me to do is remain silent and just stay away from anything where these republican fanatics will be. Good by America as I knew you. You will be missed by some.

[nearl451]

Actually,the Republicans may win, but only in the short term.

As I have been posting faithfully: The Healthcare Industry is rife for a bubble burst should reform not pass now. There is no way that the rate of increase in cost can be maintained. We see the beginnings of it now with companies co-paying less, insurers covering less, insurers charging more, continued billing innacuracies, and continued Emergency room unpaid visits by those who have no insurance.

Just like the Home price/mortgage/derivative bust and the DOT.COM bust, this one is rife.

So in the long run, Healthcare will be reformed....it's cust a question of planning or responding to the certain crisis.

[nottellin1]

You people have to get over your Republican vs Democrat ideology. Do you really know all your friends political parties and are they all really the same as yours so that you can truley say that everyone in the other party is evil. You sound like little children who aren't grown up enough to notice that none of our primary party leaders are representing any of their constiuants. DC has become another world of 'whats in it for me, screw everyone else". The problem is that our legislators have forgotten that it is 'we the poeple' not, me the politician'. Wake up and stop demonizing everyone that doesn't look, think, act and beleive exactly as you do. Or, you could move to a county that is not as free as we are in the US. If you want to live a different way than with the rights and principles that our constitution guarantees, move somewhere else!!!

[wogerwabbit]

Just to show how out of their minds these deluded people are, at a recent town-hall in South Carolina, some geezer yelled out to his Congressman "keep your government hands off my Medicare".

Do they get any dumber than that?

[jschmidt27]

?Politics does matter,? Mr. Obama insisted in the 1993 interview. ?It can make the difference in terms of a benefits check. It can make the difference in terms of school funding. Citizens can?t just remove themselves from that process. They actually have to engage themselves and not just leave it to the professionals.? Barack Obama 1993 Interview http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2009/08/previously-unseen-obama-interview-from-1993-to-be-given-new-life.html So what is the problem with people sharing their views with their legislators?

The Dems will be very surprised in 2010 if they don't take any of the protesters seriously. The mood of the country started when Rick Santelli spoke his mind on CNBC. But it has gotten worse because the Dems have not explained the healthcare bill, have not listened to people who do not want the public option for fear of a govt takeover, and because the stimulus and climate bills were pushed through without anyone reading it. The days of 'trust me' are over and no one trusts Congress as you have seen from the polls and trusting Obama is becoming very difficult for many as he pushes the deficit higher. So by ignoring the protesters and marginalizing their voice, the Dems endanger their future. By playing to the far left they are just as bad as the Republicans playing to their far right. Vote them out in 2010 and Obama in 2012.

[velma179]

Nobody is marginalizing the "protesters" voice except they, themselves.

****************

For one -- and only if you are taking polls as fact:

Congress has had the same toilet bowl ratings for a long time .. that is nothing new.

Presidents usually have better ratings only because they are nationally rather than regionally elected.

Americans love to blame politicians... and then do the same sheet that they have based accusation upon -- like overspend and maybe not be exactly truthful and... you get the picture. Representative government.

The reason these "protesters" are not going to be taken seriously is because they may be angry, sure -- but it a'int about health care reform, it is about losing their sweet spot in the "me and mine" ideology sweepstakes (to put it as kindly as I can). And it's about being sold a bill of marked up, phonied goods that have no basis in truth.

They've been incited to riot -- sure, using the aforementioned actual fear and anger -- but misplacing it for the purpose of stopping ANY meaningful reform of the VERY profitable businesses that are using them like a mask in a robbery.


I agree with protest. I love it, even. But I want it to be based on truth and sincerity of cause. I want it to be responsible...

and jschmidt27 ... I want your say as well as mine.

But if your cry, your loud voice that drowns mine says:

"I don't want the government to take over my Medicare"..... (among other either absurd or easily disproved statements)

I HAVE to ask you to stop disrupting the discussion.

Yes, yes, YES engage in the process, please Americans.. all of you --- but if you choose to speak, please take the responsibility to know what the issues and the facts are before you just blindly express "NO".

********

Protest is a very precious thing. It can serve to win a point or to utterly lose it -- it tends to create a backlash. I hope the folks disrupting meetings with their cry of "my liberty and freedoms" are prepared for others who share "our liberty and freedoms" to step up and speak as well.

[babooph]

Why not have public healthcare for dems & the republicans can have insurance company coverage-I know all the republicans do not take the medicare B when they retire -OR DO THEY!!!!!!