Protestors confront politicians at town halls megathread

[Deblano]

Technically doesn't belong in this thread, since it's about a lack of town halls, but:

Flawless Marco: I won't do town halls because people might yell at me

I'm glad I voted for John Kasich instead of Marco Rubio in the Virginia GOP primaries. What a spineless weasel.

[Badger]

Technically doesn't belong in this thread, since it's about a lack of town halls, but:

Flawless Marco: I won't do town halls because people might yell at me

I'm glad I voted for John Kasich instead of Marco Rubio in the Virginia GOP primaries. What a spineless weasel.

dittoo (for Ohio of course)

[Xing]

Technically doesn't belong in this thread, since it's about a lack of town halls, but:

Flawless Marco: I won't do town halls because people might yell at me

It makes me sad that those meanies want to yell at poor Flawless Beautiful Marco . We the taxpayers should fund a safe space for precious national snowflake treasures like him!

[krazen1211]

Rubio just won a massive landslide re-election. It makes sense for him not to deal with this rabid loser deadbeats. Why bother?

[Badger]

Rubio just won a massive landslide re-election. It makes sense for him not to deal with this rabid loser deadbeats. Why bother?

Like all those 2010 Tea Party protesters, Krazy?

I always wonder why unemployed trust funders like you call others moochers.

[NOVA Green]

Rubio just won a massive landslide re-election. It makes sense for him not to deal with this rabid loser deadbeats. Why bother?

Like all those 2010 Tea Party protesters, Krazy?

I always wonder why unemployed trust funders like you call others moochers.

Yeah---- it is kind of interesting how we have Atlas Red & Blue avatars alike, "trust fund babies" if you will, with no experience dealing with the reality of the labor market, let alone the hassles involved in what is actually involved in claiming government benefits, such as unemployment insurance, calling people "deadbeats" as some sort of bizarre political argument/attack.

I have worked constantly for 25 years in mainly a full-time capacity, and part-time (20 hours/week) in college and grad school in my '20s, and now in my early '40s for the first time ever in my life am receiving unemployment insurance that I have been paying into for decades, although obviously my goal is to actually work for decent wages on the free market based upon my skills and experience.

The 2010 Tea Party protesters are arguably the biggest "deadbeat losers" of all.... Literally you have a bunch of spoiled White Baby Boomers travelling around the country in caravans basically promoting a giant "screw you" agenda for younger and working-class Americans and protesting against ??

Meanwhile, in 2017 we have a ton of working and middle-class Americans protesting against an Administration intent on gutting the entire social safety net, actively engaged on mass deportations of Mexican-Americans and Central-Americans, destroying environmental regulations and policies that go back to the Republican Administration of Richard Nixon, not to even mention extremely flawed and dangerous foreign policy statements and positions, that quite possibly could take us into a huge economic and military disaster that would make the War on Iraq look like child's play....

Rubio is a plastic faux politician.... all image and no substance.  I'm not going to even go into the robot jokes....

He got his arse thrashed by Trump in Florida in the Pres primaries, and he was lucky to be able to claw his way out of the cave to win the GE....

I suspect that the voters of the great Sunshine State might not be as receptive come 2022 if he continues the path of his tongue continually caught up in Trump's crack....

[ProgressiveCanadian]

Lindsay Graham talking over all the boos LOL.

[krazen1211]

Yeah---- it is kind of interesting how we have Atlas Red & Blue avatars alike, "trust fund babies" if you will, with no experience dealing with the reality of the labor market, let alone the hassles involved in what is actually involved in claiming government benefits, such as unemployment insurance, calling people "deadbeats" as some sort of bizarre political argument/attack.

I have worked constantly for 25 years in mainly a full-time capacity, and part-time (20 hours/week) in college and grad school in my '20s, and now in my early '40s for the first time ever in my life am receiving unemployment insurance that I have been paying into for decades, although obviously my goal is to actually work for decent wages on the free market based upon my skills and experience.

The 2010 Tea Party protesters are arguably the biggest "deadbeat losers" of all.... Literally you have a bunch of spoiled White Baby Boomers travelling around the country in caravans basically promoting a giant "screw you" agenda for younger and working-class Americans and protesting against ??

Meanwhile, in 2017 we have a ton of working and middle-class Americans protesting against an Administration intent on gutting the entire social safety net, actively engaged on mass deportations of Mexican-Americans and Central-Americans, destroying environmental regulations and policies that go back to the Republican Administration of Richard Nixon, not to even mention extremely flawed and dangerous foreign policy statements and positions, that quite possibly could take us into a huge economic and military disaster that would make the War on Iraq look like child's play....

Rubio is a plastic faux politician.... all image and no substance.  I'm not going to even go into the robot jokes....

He got his arse thrashed by Trump in Florida in the Pres primaries, and he was lucky to be able to claw his way out of the cave to win the GE....

I suspect that the voters of the great Sunshine State might not be as receptive come 2022 if he continues the path of his tongue continually caught up in Trump's crack....

I do not know how one gets 'lucky' in winning a statewide Senate election in Florida in a Presidential year, especially as a Republican. Connie Mack and Paula Hawkins never won the massive landslide victory that Rubio just got in such years.

The funniest thing about this rant is that:

1. Trump won Florida.
2. Florida has a constant influx of those White Baby Boomers.
3. Those same White Baby Boomers are enjoying the awesome spoils of the Trump bull market!
4. I suppose based on historical patterns Senator Rubio might have a difficult 2022 re-election during the Trump 6 year itch, but here I thought the party of stupid was going to actually mount a serious challenge to our Great President in the 2020 election. Eh, probably not.

The 2010 Tea Party folks were Great People far more successful and wealthy than the current batch of Astroturfed rabble sitting around all day on the public dole.

[Virginiá]

How is a 7.7% win a landslide? I mean it's a very comfortable win, but its not a landslide.

[krazen1211]

How is a 7.7% win a landslide? I mean it's a very comfortable win, but its not a landslide.

Florida has been a tough state for Republicans to win Senate elections since the beginning of direct elections of Senators. It's never elected 2 simultaneous Republicans at all. Rubio did better than most others.

One might think that counts for something.

[Bacon King]

How is a 7.7% win a landslide? I mean it's a very comfortable win, but its not a landslide.

Florida has been a tough state for Republicans to win Senate elections since the beginning of direct elections of Senators. It's never elected 2 simultaneous Republicans at all. Rubio did better than most others.

One might think that counts for something.

In 2014 Montana's Class II Senate Seat ended an entire century of uninterrupted Democratic officeholders but that doesn't mean Steve Daines' 18 point win against a math teacher with an entirely unfunded campaign was in any way unexpected and it says nothing about Daines himself. You can massage statistics to make any claim you want but just because Robio did a little bit better than other candidates in his situation have, it doesn't mean he gets to suddenly start ignoring the people he represents

[pbrower2a]

US Rep. Michael Burgess of Texas is holding a town hall on Saturday. This is how the local Republican Party is promoting it:



Instead, here's how it ended:

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Sad!

Texas is R-leaning in statewide and federal elections to the extent that the suburbs of Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston, Austin, and San Antonio are strongly Republican. Suburbs of Chicago, Detroit, San Francisco, Boston, New York,  Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington have not been so strongly Republican.

It has been nearly a quarter century since I lived in the general area of Representative Burgess' district, and I remember when suburban Dallas went from D to R in the 1980s. We need to remember that the suburbs of Dallas that had some very rural character a quarter-century ago have lost the rural characteristics. Air pollution (for a big city with a hot climate, Dallas had rather clean air) is more severe. Traffic jams are getting worse. Hastily-built infrastructure needs costly renovation and maintenance.

Note also that Texas isn't the vulgar, hick world that it once had a reputation for. Texas is now above average in educational achievement. Well-educated people were more able to see through Donald Trump before he was elected, and they can see through him and his policies even more.   

Donald Trump got only 52.23% of the popular vote in Texas in 2016 in a true binary race. it could be that he reminds people of their landlords, not a popular group of people in urban settings (people who see renters only as cash cows)... but the Congressional Representative may not have that problem. Their problem could be a President unpopular for other reasons.

Could Texas be the next Virginia for Republicans? Absolutely not. Should it swing away from the GOP in the next Presidential election it takes nearly three times as many electoral votes as Virginia. 38 electoral votes -- that is more than Michigan and Pennsylvania together; as much as Iowa, North Carolina, and Ohio together; and one fewer than Florida and Wisconsin together. Except in 1968 Republicans have not won the Presidency without Texas...

If Americans despise President Trump in November 2018 they have but one reliable recourse: the House of Representatives. 

   

[Ronnie]

Lindsey Graham gets mercilessly booed at his town hall.  He's too nice to deserve such a thing, right?

http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/322354-graham-booed-at-town-hall-after-saying-he-mostly-agrees-with-trump

[krazen1211]

How is a 7.7% win a landslide? I mean it's a very comfortable win, but its not a landslide.

Florida has been a tough state for Republicans to win Senate elections since the beginning of direct elections of Senators. It's never elected 2 simultaneous Republicans at all. Rubio did better than most others.

One might think that counts for something.

In 2014 Montana's Class II Senate Seat ended an entire century of uninterrupted Democratic officeholders but that doesn't mean Steve Daines' 18 point win against a math teacher with an entirely unfunded campaign was in any way unexpected and it says nothing about Daines himself. You can massage statistics to make any claim you want but just because Robio did a little bit better than other candidates in his situation have, it doesn't mean he gets to suddenly start ignoring the people he represents

Those are not statistics. They are actual election results. And Rubio's massive election victory is only part of the puzzle. It is far more notable that the Senate has staggered 6 year terms, and that Rubio is not up for re-election until 2022, and that this is an intentional design by the founders. The rabble can go harass the other Senator of Florida who is up in 2018.

Of course, Rubio is not ignoring the people he represents, but rather handing off some of the constituent services to his staff. Staggered elections means the Senator himself can sit on the nice beaches of Florida for a while. We all know he wants to be President anyway.

[Badger]

Yeah---- it is kind of interesting how we have Atlas Red & Blue avatars alike, "trust fund babies" if you will, with no experience dealing with the reality of the labor market, let alone the hassles involved in what is actually involved in claiming government benefits, such as unemployment insurance, calling people "deadbeats" as some sort of bizarre political argument/attack.

I have worked constantly for 25 years in mainly a full-time capacity, and part-time (20 hours/week) in college and grad school in my '20s, and now in my early '40s for the first time ever in my life am receiving unemployment insurance that I have been paying into for decades, although obviously my goal is to actually work for decent wages on the free market based upon my skills and experience.

The 2010 Tea Party protesters are arguably the biggest "deadbeat losers" of all.... Literally you have a bunch of spoiled White Baby Boomers travelling around the country in caravans basically promoting a giant "screw you" agenda for younger and working-class Americans and protesting against ??

Meanwhile, in 2017 we have a ton of working and middle-class Americans protesting against an Administration intent on gutting the entire social safety net, actively engaged on mass deportations of Mexican-Americans and Central-Americans, destroying environmental regulations and policies that go back to the Republican Administration of Richard Nixon, not to even mention extremely flawed and dangerous foreign policy statements and positions, that quite possibly could take us into a huge economic and military disaster that would make the War on Iraq look like child's play....

Rubio is a plastic faux politician.... all image and no substance.  I'm not going to even go into the robot jokes....

He got his arse thrashed by Trump in Florida in the Pres primaries, and he was lucky to be able to claw his way out of the cave to win the GE....

I suspect that the voters of the great Sunshine State might not be as receptive come 2022 if he continues the path of his tongue continually caught up in Trump's crack....

I do not know how one gets 'lucky' in winning a statewide Senate election in Florida in a Presidential year, especially as a Republican. Connie Mack and Paula Hawkins never won the massive landslide victory that Rubio just got in such years.

The funniest thing about this rant is that:

1. Trump won Florida.
2. Florida has a constant influx of those White Baby Boomers.
3. Those same White Baby Boomers are enjoying the awesome spoils of the Trump bull market!
4. I suppose based on historical patterns Senator Rubio might have a difficult 2022 re-election during the Trump 6 year itch, but here I thought the party of stupid was going to actually mount a serious challenge to our Great President in the 2020 election. Eh, probably not.

The 2010 Tea Party folks were Great People far more successful and wealthy than the current batch of Astroturfed rabble sitting around all day on the public dole.

Nonesense. Spoken like a true trust funder who doesn't work.

[Badger]

How is a 7.7% win a landslide? I mean it's a very comfortable win, but its not a landslide.

Florida has been a tough state for Republicans to win Senate elections since the beginning of direct elections of Senators. It's never elected 2 simultaneous Republicans at all. Rubio did better than most others.

One might think that counts for something.

In 2014 Montana's Class II Senate Seat ended an entire century of uninterrupted Democratic officeholders but that doesn't mean Steve Daines' 18 point win against a math teacher with an entirely unfunded campaign was in any way unexpected and it says nothing about Daines himself. You can massage statistics to make any claim you want but just because Robio did a little bit better than other candidates in his situation have, it doesn't mean he gets to suddenly start ignoring the people he represents

Those are not statistics. They are actual election results. And Rubio's massive election victory is only part of the puzzle. It is far more notable that the Senate has staggered 6 year terms, and that Rubio is not up for re-election until 2022, and that this is an intentional design by the founders. The rabble can go harass the other Senator of Florida who is up in 2018.

Of course, Rubio is not ignoring the people he represents, but rather handing off some of the constituent services to his staff. Staggered elections means the Senator himself can sit on the nice beaches of Florida for a while. We all know he wants to be President anyway.

LOL!!!

[Badger]

3. Those same White Baby Boomers are enjoying the awesome spoils of the Trump Obama bull market!

Corrected

[Badger]

3. Those same White Baby Boomers are enjoying the awesome spoils of the Trump Obama bull market!

Corrected for non-troll reality.

I'll borrow from another recent post of mine from another simpleton.

LOL!! Naso Krazey, you utter buffoon. Google a chart of the last 10 years of the S&P 500. Starting from a nadir 6 weeks after Obama's inauguration it's value has more than QUADRUPLED. And yet you never to my recollection mentioned one word of that uncomfortable (for you) fact in the last 8 years. President Pussygrabber is on the job less than a month and suddenly it's all because of HIM?!?

This is a stupid, stupid post even for you. And that's saying a lot.

[MeanBeanMachine]

It's awful to not be able to have a discussion without interruptions.  They even interrupted a prayer which is most distasteful.  These so called protests are being engineered by wealthy donors as usual.  Politicians should still be showing up though.  It's their duty to listen to their citizens no matter how obnoxious. 

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

It's awful to not be able to have a discussion without interruptions.  They even interrupted a prayer which is most distasteful.  These so called protests are being engineered by wealthy donors as usual.  Politicians should still be showing up though.  It's their duty to listen to their citizens no matter how obnoxious. 

No, they're not.  My Congressman (Pat Tiberi) skipped a townhall with hundreds of people because he was too cowardly to answer his constituents' questions.  That's the sort of thing that pisses people off; it gives everyone the sense he's hiding something.  I imagine people start getting angry when 1) they know their Congressperson is bullsh**tting and B) when folks like Stivers and Tiberi refuse to answer questions from their own constituents (say what you will about Tom McClintock and Tom Reed, but at least they're answering questions).  Anyway, we ended up putting up a cardboard cutout of Tiberi   Two questions were definitely from Republicans: one person wanted assurances that "Trumpcare" would not be Obamacare-lite and the other was from a guy who supported Obamacare despite having a MAGA hat (he wanted the government to "keep its hands off my healthcare" and didn't seem to know Obamacare and the ACA were the same thing). 

Most Ohioans (in both parties) simply oppose repealing Obamacare even though it was originally absolutely despised in much of Ohio back in 2009/2010.  There's a reason Kasich wasn't worried about local backlash when he fought for Medicaid expansion and it isn't that he was planning to run for President (although that probably contributed to his decision to do so).  Most folks here know someone whose family is benifiting from the ACA and as a result, repealing it now would be about as popular as privatizing Social Security or repealing Medicare.  Even most rank-and-file Republicans (i.e. regular folks who aren't activists or politicians) are not too enthusiastic about doing so and smell a rat WRT the "repeal and replace" schtick.  Everyone around here knows the Republicans have no interest in replacing Obamacare with anything positive; it's just common sense.  Obamacare has been around long enough for people to get used to its benefits and once people get used to having healthcare, they understandably aren't too keen on the government randomly taking it away from them.

TL;DR: People aren't being recruited by liberal groups, they're pissed off that Congress is trying to take away millions of people's health insurance and are blatantly ignoring the will of their constituents.  The fact that they keep promising to "repeal and replace" despite having so little confidence in their joke of a proposal that they won't even defend it to their constituents is both deeply insulting and exactly the sort of thing that makes situations like this even worse.  Say what you will about Obamacare, but at least the Democrats had townhalls. Imagine if the Democrats said "we're passing some big healthcare overhaul, but our constituents aren't allowed to ask us about anything ever until we pass it, we're not going to give the CBC time to estimate its cost before we vote, and you should just trust us that everything will be hunky dory "  The tea-party protests would be nothing compared to how pissed folks would be! 

[Brittain33]

Tom Cotton said this weekend that passing the current TrumpCare bill could throw the House Majority into danger, so clearly the town hall meeting he held was effective for the opposition.

[Deblano]

It's awful to not be able to have a discussion without interruptions.  They even interrupted a prayer which is most distasteful.  These so called protests are being engineered by wealthy donors as usual.  Politicians should still be showing up though.  It's their duty to listen to their citizens no matter how obnoxious. 

It is good though to see our elected officials be shown the fangs every once in a while, considering how they have become more smug and lazy over the years.

[Hindsight was 2020]

Joe Barton tells a audience member to "shut up" https://www.google.com/amp/www.mediaite.com/online/gop-rep-joe-barton-tells-constituent-to-shut-up-in-heated-town-hall/amp/

[Deblano]

Joe Barton tells a audience member to "shut up" https://www.google.com/amp/www.mediaite.com/online/gop-rep-joe-barton-tells-constituent-to-shut-up-in-heated-town-hall/amp/

Whoops! Bad move, Joe.

SAD!

[The Arizonan]

Joe Barton tells a audience member to "shut up" https://www.google.com/amp/www.mediaite.com/online/gop-rep-joe-barton-tells-constituent-to-shut-up-in-heated-town-hall/amp/

How did the constituent know about Jackie Speier? She's somewhat obscure.