More from the Health Care Town Hall Meetings

Bricklayers and members of dozens of other unions told Congress it’s time to pass health care reform.

Yesterday, members of Congress met in town hall sessions with constituents who were on Capitol Hill to rally and demand health care reform. Here are a few reports that came in after the meetings.

At the Health Care Providers Town Hall
Former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean got a zinger in at opponents who are claiming a public health care option plan would lead to “socialized medicine.”

You know who has socialized medicine in this country? Everyone over 65 and everybody in Congress.

Other quotes from Dean:

When doctors and nurses work together, things happen….

Right now, we have rationing in private health care….

The right wing is running around saying Massachusetts didn’t work. But they shouldn’t say that because the reason it didn’t work is because they didn’t put in a public plan.

From Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.):

This is the moment I’ve been waiting for my entire adult life….

We can solve this problem, and we can do it in the next few weeks….

The goal of this whole exercise is not to prop up the profits of the private health insurance industry…and we don’t have to apologize for that.

And from Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.):

There are some folks who plain just want to see us fail….

One of the most compelling arguments for health care reform is that we end up paying one way or another.

Talking to the Media
An hour-long Tampa roundtable discussion was taped in full by radio station WMNF, which planned to play portions last evening. Speakers at the event included: Jodi Ray of Florida Kid Care; Bill Dever, business agent with Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local 915; and a worker with a personal health care story. Also there: state Rep. Betty Reed (D) and staff from the offices of U.S. Rep. Kathy Castor and Sen. Bill Nelson, both Florida Democrats.

In Montana, activists met with a reporter from the Great Falls Tribune. Mayme, a Helena woman who completed the AFL-CIO’s 2009 Health Care for America Survey, told about her family’s nightmare with today’s health care system and had the reporter and activists nearly in tears. Mayme’s employer, an orthodontist, is doing everything he can to provide health care coverage for his staff but is increasingly overwhelmed by soaring costs.

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