2 Comments

1. On August 8, 2009 at 1:32 pm, CS says:

   hmmmm…

   Found at http://leisureguy.wordpress.com/2009/08/05/how-those-town-hall-protests-are-funded-and-organized

   Brian Beutler reporting for TPMDC:

   Yesterday, I reported [2] that the anti-health care reform group Conservatives for Patients Rights was enlisting tea party protesters to attend and disrupt health care town halls hosted by members of Congress in their regions.

   Today, CPR—which is headed by disgraced hospital executive Rick Scott [1] and has enlisted the message men behind the Swift Boat campaign—has acknowledged their behind-the-scenes role in the outbursts.

   Spokesman Brian Burgess tells Greg Sargent [3] that CPR is distributing “town hall alert” flyers to people on its mailing lists and is reaching out to third party groups via online listserv.

   Perhaps the most significant of these discussion groups is the called Tea Party Patriots, [4] which is managed by Tom Gaitens, a field organizer for the industry-funded lobbying organization FreedomWorks [5] [5a] Members of this listserve were not only supplied with list of town hall forums, but with a strategy document outlining the same disruptive techniques we’re seeing play out at health care public forums around the country.

   The disclosure makes official what much of the reporting about the disruptions seemed to indicate: that industry funded groups–who stand to benefit if health reform legislation fails–are playing a significant role in organizing, and perhaps ginning up, the outbursts we’re seeing at health care public forums around the country.
   —————————

   [1] Scott founded the Columbia Hospital Corporation in 1987 and later merged Columbia/HCA along with the brother of Senator Bill Frist Columbia HCA Chairman Thomas J. Frist in 1989, but was ousted by the company’s board of directors in 1997 in the midst of the nation’s biggest health care fraud scandal in which the company ultimately plead guilty to the nation’s then largest Medicaid and Medicare fraud and paid a record fine of $1.7 Billion dollars.
   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_L._Scott

   [2] http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/08/inside-the-tea-partiers-anti-health-care-organizing-campaign.php

   [3] http://theplumline.whorunsgov.com/health-care/anti-reform-group-takes-credit-for-helping-gin-up-town-hall-rallies

   [4] http://teapartypatriots.org/HC.aspx

   [5] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=FreedomWorks

   [5a] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=FreedomWorks#Non-profit_for_hire.3F

   ———

   Chicken-and-egg? Glass houses? Take your pick.
2. On August 9, 2009 at 11:21 pm, Cnation says:

   Ever since this whole movement started, there have been groups attaching themselves to it. If you look back at the post I made back in April about the Tax Day Tea Party, you’ll see where I took issue with the NC GOP’s presence there as though they were part of it. They weren’t. That’s not to say I don’t welcome the support in this particular battle - in this case, the old saying "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" is something I can live with for now.

   You may well find some corporate/financial interests coming out against the proposed healthcare reform bills, but they’re certainly not -driving- or directing anything. All they’re doing is latching on to a passing freight train. The anger of the people, the outrage, the line in the sand is very, very real. The accusations by the left that we’re just a bunch of sheep being led around by our noses by high-dollar corporate interests is both ridiculous and insulting. 100% pure leftist propaganda.

   You’re 4000 miles away in another country and have lived there for what, thirty years now? Without being here and seeing for yourself what’s going on - talking to people, etc….there’s no way I or anyone else can convey the sense of betrayal the average person feels at the hands of the current administration and our elected officials, and there’s simply no way you can possibly presume to gauge or understand the passion and resolve of the people or the legitimacy of the movement as a whole. Nor can you understand the extent to which the MSM and the left (including the huffington post) are flat-out lying about what we’re doing, why we’re doing it, and what is motivating us.

   Example:

   • We’re being bussed in - lie.
   • We’re being paid - lie.
   • We’re insurance company ‘plants’ - lie.
   • We’re agents of the republican party - lie.
   • We’re ‘fringe’ - lie. This is quite literally the same crowd that I spent years on soccer field sidelines with, cheering on our kids and discussing the weather.
   • We’re being violent? Lie. So far, all of the violence that’s been reported was initiated and/or perpretrated solely by those on the liberal side of the aisle. ALL of it.

   I’m not going to spend a lot of time defending what we do against the massive amounts of disinformation being perpetuated by the left. I’ll say this though - even if we -were- guilty of what they’re accusing us of, so what? They’re accusing us of exactly the same tactics they’ve been using for the better part of 40 years, and then prentending to be ‘outraged’ over it. Is that really the kind of disingenuousness you want to be associated with?

   All the left is trying to do at this point is kill the messenger, because on the facts of the proposed bills, the American people know a loser when they see it.

   -Cnation

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