Congresswoman Louise Slaughter has made it clear why she won't host health care town hall meetings. She believes that the town halls have been nothing but forums for protesters and those who only want to disrupt and misinform the public.
The powerful Democrat said she held meetings during the health care debate of 1993 but is concerned about public safety this time. During a meeting of the Democrat and Chronicle editorial board, she referred to a town hall meeting with President Barack Obama in New Hampshire in which a man brought a gun.
"I think it's a way to disseminate misinformation," Slaughter said. "They're not debating things that are in the bill."
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Reform of the system has attracted great public interest and caused rumors about the bill, many of which are not true.
"The idea that any American citizen would believe that their country would line up old people and do away with them is so, it's embarrassing that Americans would believe that," Slaughter said.
Slaughter remembers the debate over health care during the Clinton administration and said that Democrats are no more prepared for the opposition now than they were 14 years ago.
"We simply can't control any message anywhere," she said. "We are so big on transparency, let's write it all down, let's make sure it's all up on the Internet, knowing full well ... that people are going to pick out something that isn't there."
The right-wing is trying to take advantage of everything Democrats say, even safe ones like Slaughter. In a recent radio interview, Slaughter said the following:
The video was posted on Breitbart, a conservative website. Now, Politico has picked up on the misinformation by pushing the claim that Slaughter saying "won't give these people a forum" was a message intended for her constituents, which is far from the truth and distorts reality. The intent was clear: Slaughter will not give a forum to the conservative lunatics whose only goal is to disrupt, not debate.
Yet, this is an outright distortion that is exactly the type of misinformation Slaughter is talking about. The same people that are responsible for this distortion are also the ones distorting the facts on the health care reform bill and on health care reform in general. Coincidence? Definitely not.
