Maybe Fox should have realized they had a credibility problem when the townhall protestor they had in for an interview this morning went from saying Obama wanted to sentence his family to death to claiming that Nancy Pelosi and Steny Hoyer had health care policy “thugs” to his house in the middle of the night as payback for his townhall tirade.
When I posed that question this morning, I intended primarily to call out the cable nets and others for letting the public debate veer so far off point that doctors had become irrelevant to it. But in reader responses to the post, I detected a thread of suspicion and wariness about the health care reform plan even among docs with progressive sensibilities. I don’t think that fully explains the absence from the public forum that I was noting, but it would surprise me if it doesn’t play a part.
Here’s a sampling of the responses from physician readers: Read More
We came into the office this morning to find two reports of firearms showing up at townhall events. The first in Tennessee turned out to be basically a non-story. But police in Douglas, Arizona are investigating an incident in which one townhall attendee dropped a gun at an event with Rep. Grabrielle Giffords (D-AZ).
Giffords aides called police after finding the gun and being concerned for her safety.
We’ve posted the ethics agreement and the waiver that were the subject of the big Sunday Times piece on then-Treasury secretary Hank Paulson’s extensive communications with Goldman Sachs around the time Goldman was rescued by the bailout of AIG.
From TPM Reader CS …
I just saw the clips of Mike Sola and have to say that the Democratic Party has completely lost the message war. Social Security Disability Insurance and Medicaid were created by the Democratic Party for the sole purpose of allowing people with disabilities and retired people to live their lives with independence and dignity–against fierce opposition from the Republican Party. The Democrats have allowed the right [to claim] that the left now wants to kill those people they fought so hard to protect. Can some Democrat please–please call the right out on this and pass some bill, even if only a token, to assure the solvency of SSI and Medicare? Something, anything, please! I am a civil rights attorney who specializes in disability rights and there is no–NO civil right legislation that is Republican.
Let me start by saying that while I share the sentiment, I don’t agree as a matter of fact. While the president’s plan may be in rough waters, I don’t think they’ve lost the message war. Because I think the number of people who actually believe this stuff is really, really small.
But that doesn’t mean it is insignificant.
I’ve spent the last day or so trying to get my head around just where the health care debate is right now because it’s clearly in a place where any sort of logic is incapable of making sense of what’s going on. Read More
The founder of the Special Olympics and sister to Jack, Bobby and Teddy has died at age 88.
White House flack, on their new communications strategy for health care reform:
There’s a whole set of rumors that the old playbook would tell you not to do anything about because you draw attention. The lesson we’ve learned is you ignore these rumors at your peril, and the right answer is to take them head on in as big a way as possible.
That and the day’s other political news in the TPMDC Morning Roundup.