More lies? I guess we should have expected that.
Madanthonywayne said:
As our hard working congressmen and Senators make their way home, they are being greeted with open arms by a constituency well pleased with their efforts. They wish. What is actually happening is they are being berated and shouted down all over the country as the grassroots reacts to Obama's attempt to cram his health plan down our throats, among other things.
Yes, we can always count on you.
The angry-mob style protesters who have infiltrated town halls around the country are the non-organic product of "tea-baggers," "birthers," and the conservative fringe, two Senate Democratic leaders said Tuesday.
Speaking outside the White House after meeting with President Obama, Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois and Chuck Schumer of New York both dismissed the significance of boisterous protesters who have been interrupting Democratic lawmakers' events.
"It is a small fringe group," Schumer told the Huffington Post, "and if we let a small group of people who want to monopolize the conversation and not listen to the facts win, you may as well hang it up."
"These town hall meetings have been orchestrated by the tea baggers and the birthers to just be a free-for-alls, make a lot of noise, go on YouTube and show discord," said Durbin. "I mean that is what they are determined to do. But that is not going to accomplish what we need to accomplish: real health care reform" ....
.... The remarks made by the two Senate Democrats reflect the overall message coming from the White House and Democratic Party. Asked during the press briefing on Tuesday whether he thought the town hall protests were fabricated chaos from the insurance and private health care industry, Press Secretary Robert Gibbs responded: "Some of it is, yes."
"In fact I think you have had groups today, Conservatives for Patients Rights, that have bragged about organizing and manufacturing that anger," Gibbs said.
(Stein)
And Conservatives for Patients' Rights?
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.
In response to my questions, a spokesman for the group confirmed that it has undertaken a concerted effort to get people out to the town hall meetings to protest reform. The spokesperson, Brian Burgess, confirmed that CPR is emailing out “town hall alert” flyers, and schedules of town hall meetings, to its mailing list.
These efforts — combined with CPR’s effort to enlist Tea Party-ers, as reported yesterday by TPM — provide a glimpse into the ways anti-reform groups are trying to create a sense of public momentum in their favor.
CPR spokesman Burgess confirmed that the group had set up a list serv designed to reach out to “third party groups” involved in the health care fight, including the Tea Party activists. And in a statement emailed to me, Scott, who was ousted as a health-care exec amid a 1990s fraud probe, took credit for the town hall showings.
“We have invested a lot of time, energy and resources into educating Americans over the past several months about the dangers of government-run health care and I think we’re seeing some of the fruits of that campaign,” Scott said, though he claimed outrage was spontaneous.
(Sargent)
The only "grass roots" thing taking place here is more paranoid, anti-Obama obstructionism.
These teabaggers disrupting congressional town halls is just a spontaneous groundswell of populist opposition to health care reform, right? Riiiight.
On Friday, July 24, a representative of Conservatives for Patients Rights--the anti-health care reform group run by disgraced hospital executive Rick Scott, in conjunction with the message men behind the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth--sent an email to a list serve (called the Tea Party Patriots Health Care Reform Committee) containing a spreadsheet that lists over one hundred congressional town halls from late July into September.
The email from CPR to tea baggers suggests that, though conservatives portray the tea bagger disruptions as symptoms of a populist rebellion roiling unprompted through key districts around the country, they have to a great extent been orchestrated by anti-health care reform groups financed by industry. (CPR did not immediately respond to a request for comment.)
That email predates by about a week a recent flurry of events at which Democratic members of Congress have been accosted and harassed by anti-health care reform tea party protesters. But beyond putting those spectacles, now receiving wide play on cable news, into a fresh light, it also provides a window into the tea party protesters' organizing infrastructure, which, like so much political organizing today, occurs in private email list serves.
(Beutler)
I find it ironic that a "grass roots" movement worried about government in healthcare would rally behind a
former business partner of President George W. Bush who was ousted from his own chain of hospitals after the organization got busted in a broad Medicare fraud scheme that would eventually cost it $1.7 billion in civil and criminal penalties.
The effort is being coordinated by
Creative Response Concepts, a high-profile PR firm that spearheaded the infamous Swift Boat attacks against Sen. John Kerry in the 2004 election. Its client list includes the RNC, the National Republican Congressional Committee, National Republican Senatorial Committee, Christian Coalition, National Taxpayers Union, Media Research Center, and Regnery Publishers. Through the same office telephone number, you can also contact the
Judicial Confirmation Network, whose website is run by
Campaign Solutons, a Republican campaign consulting firm enlisted by the RNC, NRCC, and Bush-Cheney '04.
Yeah, real grass roots. Yet, ironically—perhaps predictably—as these facts emerge for widespread public consideration, here comes Madanthonywayne crowing about "Grass Roots Fury Over Obama Care".
It's a con job.
___________________
Notes:
Stein, Sam. "Durbin, Schumer: Town Hall Protesters Are 'Birthers' 'Tea Baggers,' And 'Fringe'". Huffington Post. August 4, 2009. HuffingtonPost.com. August 4, 2009. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/08/04/durbin-schumer-town-hall_n_251077.html
Sargent, Greg. "Anti-Reform Group Takes Credit For Helping Gin Up Town Hall Rallies". The Plum Line. August 4, 2009. WhoRunsGov.com. August 4, 2009. http://theplumline.whorunsgov.com/h...-credit-for-helping-gin-up-town-hall-rallies/
Beutler, Brian. "Inside The Tea Partiers Anti-Health Care Organizing Campaign". Talking Points Memo. August 3, 2004. TPMDC.TalkingPointsMemo.com. August 4, 2009. http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/...iers-anti-health-care-organizing-campaign.php
"Rick Scott". SourceWatch. 2009. SourceWatch.org. August 4, 2009. http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Rick_Scott
"Creative Response Concepts". SourceWatch. 2009. SourceWatch.org. August 4, 2009. http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=CRC_Public_Relations
"Judicial Confirmation Network". SourceWatch. 2009. SourceWatch.org. August 4, 2009. http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Judicial_Confirmation_Network
"Donatelli Group". SourceWatch. 2009. SourceWatch.org. August 4, 2009. http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Campaign_Solutions
