Police broke up a raucous crowd outside a Tampa, Fla., town hall meeting on healthcare Thursday, and a fistfight broke out inside the meeting, witnesses said.
Hundreds of people turned out for the meeting at the Children’s Board of Hillsborough County, and people on opposing sides yelled and chanted outside, WTSP-TV, Tampa Bay, reported.
From what I can make out from news stories, people who showed up to stop the meeting were outraged that there were people there who actually supported health care reform and who got seats in the hall.
Congratulations, wingnuts. You’ve turned into the new DFHs.
I was watching this on MSNBC. Then came interviews with Pat Buchanan. Then came clips of Rush Limbaugh calling Obama a Nazi.
I could not understand why the police and fire department had not forced them to clear the hallways that led from the venue doors. It looked very unsafe.
It seems that the AFLCIO members are going to attend these meetings to try to counter the small but vocal majority. They’d better hope my longshoremen buddies do not show up. Seriously, they have short fuses and would be an ominous physical presence, nothing like what weve seen thus far.
I was sickened by it all, turned the tv off and went to bed to try and forget.
Many of the comments are hysterical. Not as in funny-hysterical, but filled with hysteria. They may disagree that their movement is astroturfed, but they’ve been played like a violin. They’ve heard so much about forced abortions and killing grandma that they’re running around screaming like chickens with their heads cut off! You can’t reason with the panicked: how are we supposed to reach these people?
I don’t think they can be reached. They watch and listen to the propaganda and are brain washed. My in-laws are smart, retired professionals who watch Fox endlessly. They always voted Republican but in the last 5-10 years they have escalated into nut ville, it’s actually sad to see. The last time we got together the conversation was around abolishing the Fed and instituting a barter economy. I’m guessing it was someone on Fox who was spouting this idiocy. They’re on Medicare, of course, but believe that the government should get completely out of health care. Good luck buying insurance when you’re 80 years old on the open market. I wonder how many goats would be the co-pay on medicine? My father-in-law didn’t think that was very funny.
They have every right to protest outside, but when their only aim is to actually halt the proceedings of a meeting and shout out angry verses to stifle anyone opposed to them, it is long past time to show them any courtesy whatsoever. And now fighting?
It is like they do not even remember how carefully the audiences were screened for GOP run shows just a year ago. And dissenters that did sneak in were escorted out in short order.
It is like they do not even remember how carefully the audiences were screened for GOP run shows just a year ago.
I’m sure they have no idea that ever happened. This is not exactly a high-information crowd.
Sadly, the violence will come…
Think about how many times you’ve read some hyper-conservative troll either here on this site or on other liberal ones where they say, ‘… go ahead. Just remember, WE’RE the ones with the guns.’
There have been many great conservative people who’ve commented here and on the other sites I read. They’re not the ones I worry about. It’s the knuckle-dragging, FOX-viewing, Rush and Savage listening cretins who will bring a gun and start shooting. To the uninformed, or those who can’t properly use their rationing skills to forward their argument, a bullet is an exclamation point.
buckyblue,
GOATS? Now THAT’S funny! Unfortunately, conservatives lack empathy, which is where humor resides.
I think the violence is already here, and I doubt it’s going to stop until the mob kills somebody.
maha,
To a kid who grew up in NY City, a few fistfights ain’t violence:-)
All kidding aside, you’re right. The violence is already here.