BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA'S BRIDGE TOO FAR
Posted on 08/12/2009 6:54:54 AM PDT by WayneLusvardi
The eminent sociologist of religion Peter L. Berger tells a humorous but apt story about Communist Russia from Soviet times that perhaps reflects what happened at U.S. Congressman Adam Schiff's agitprop Health Care Townhall meeting in Alhambra Tuesday night:
"I read somewhere that there was some usual anti-religious campaign by the Communist Party and an agitprop (propaganda) person was sent to a Russian village and gave a one-hour lecture on scientific atheism; all the villagers had to listen to it. At the end of the lecture the Communist Party operative said, "We are very tolerant here. The priest can have five minutes for a rebuttal." (Laughter.)
The priest went up front and said he didn't need five minutes. He turned to the assembled village and said, "Christ is risen."
And the villagers replied in the liturgical formula of Eastern liturgy: "He's risen indeed." That's all he said, and that was all necessary to say."
Schiff's Townhall meeting was originally to be held in a small theater where only about 200 could be accommodated. Due to the huge turnout, estimated between 4,000 to 6,000, the meeting was instead held outdoors on a stage in front of the Library in Alhambra. By the sound of the crowd, those opposing the proposed health care reform were in much greater numbers than the proponents.
The meeting was not an American Townhall format. It was more like the Soviet propaganda meeting described above. Health care experts all with affiliations with the Democratic Party and pro-Obama-care shared the stage with Schiff. They were all given microphones and given time to filibuster the first half of the meeting with lectures and propaganda in support of Obama-care.
Questions were taken from the audience but none of the questioners was given a microphone. Instead their questions had to be translated by moderator Dr. Bruce Hensel. Their voices and their rage were muted out and marginalized because no one could hear them over the sound of the crowd. Their voices were relegated to heckling, shouting over the speakers from afar, waving signs, all to no avail. Schiff and his entourage of elitist experts propounded the advantages of "scientific" health care and "computerized" medical records which would lower costs and shift health care delivery from quantitative care to qualitative care. Faith was to be placed in technocracy and bureaucracy. The Hippocratic Oath and the doctor-patient relationship was to be replaced with the House of Representative Health Care Reform Act. It was as if the Nicene Creed could be replaced with HR 3200.
Neither Schiff, nor any of the technocratic experts, dared to mention the propsed health care reform would inevitably entail the end of chemotherapy and tumor removal surgeries for those with cancer. Shifting shifting to outcomes based health care would mean the end of costly cancer treatments with a low probability of cure. It might also mean the end of angioplasty and stents for those with blocked arteries. Instead, patients would be assigned "preventive" care and a vegan diet.
The message from Congressman Schiff was unambiguous. Effectively, Schiff might as well of said to his constituents who oppose Obamacare "your comments on the proposed health care bill before the House of Representatives are unimportant to me. The "experts" are all in favor of reform and we know what is best for you. I've got my mind made up and I'm going to sign the health care bill as proposed. Now you can go away mad, but just go away."
Like the Russian peasants in a rural village given a lecture on scientific atheism the American peasants could only recite their muted protests and wave their signs. If I hadn't been at a so-called American Townhall meeting in Alhambra tonight I could have sworn I was at the Soviet era Communist Party lecture in a rural Russian village described above. The nomenklatura (ruling class) has signaled they are taking over and you better like it.
Certainly, the above reflections are not to label Congressman Adam Schiff a "commie," thus relegating myself to the category of the "crazies" on the political right, many of whom were in attendance. But somehow I got the feeling that these Townhall meetings were historical, much like some of the scenes in the movie Dr. Zhivago where the Bolsheviks have finally ascended to power in old Russia. We are witnessing a cultural shift of historical proportions. Now the phrase "better red than dead" had taken on a whole new meaning.
That's okay, I'll go ahead and do it.
“...we are witnessing a shift of historical proportions.”
Go ahead and put me in the “category of crazies” too. We are truly witnessing the most free, yet widespread, government takeover in the history of the world. Call it socialism, communism or whatever you want, but it is a power grab, period.
Then get a bull horn. If that doesn’t work get a loud car stereo system and boom in the questions; if that doesn’t work get louder and louder.
That is a huge crowd.
And if that doesn’t work, get a hugh group loaded with buckets of tar, and bags of feathers.
I was there. The crowd was a few thousand, and about 60/40 anti “reform”.
Adam and his “experts” had their talking points. One was overtly anti insurance industry - I know insurance law and he openly lied to the audience to make the industry evil and the public option our only salvation.
It was pretty sad - my wife and I left early and had dinner.
Indeed. 6,000 people at a townhall meeting? In Alhambra? On a weekday? Something is going on here folks, and it is not limited to healthcare. November 2010 could be very interesting.
Yup. And I suspect that those 6,000 people did NOT show up because they believe that everything is moving along in good order. The Democratic Party orchestration of the meeting to muzzle the crowd and control the proceedings probably only served to further reinforce the alienation of the participants.
Let’s see what happens in 2010.....
Representative Gene Green, (d)Houston, said essentially the same thing: SCREW U.
For a similar perspective read Ivan Keneally, The Public Option, National Review Online at this link:
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZTAzM2FlN2JkZjA4MWNmM2UxNmRiOTljN2Q2ZWEzMmU=
Excerpt: The key ingredients of President Obama’s election victory were technocratic competence and a therapeutic populism — his Ivy League intellect would be the key to solving our average-Joe problems. Nevertheless, it’s not at all clear that the technocratic conception of politics is compatible with a robust deliberative democracy. And Obama’s technocratic side is winning out.
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