Now, today's perspective

So there are the writings I did during the elections (and shortly thereafter). What I would like to express now, is how PROUD I am of all the people who are standing up and expressing their distrust in their government, and voicing their opinions on healthcare and other issues. It warms my heart to see so many who have sat on the couch for years, yelling at the TV, get out there to town hall meetings and let their representatives know how they feel. This intrusion into our lives has reached a breaking point for so many people! And it amazes me the way some of the congressman/women have responded to them, refusing to answer their questions because they asked them loudly and angrily. This should be a wake-up call to these congressmen, that people are fed-up! Instead they are derogatory to them and brush off their questions without a valid answer. They try to discredit them. They refer to them as 'the mob'. They try to say they are 'organized' and coming on buses and are paid for; but many of these people are older Americans and are just fed-up.

I did see one congressman at a town hall meeting on C-SPAN, from a southern state (a blue-dog democrat), who handled himself and an angry crowd very well; in fact, the other members of congress should take a lesson from him in diplomacy! While answering a constituent's question, if someone shouted out a question, he would turn to them and say, "Let me finish answering this question, I'll get to you". He didn't look down his nose at them; he didn't look intimidated and overwhelmed; he took it all in stride, and actually showed compassion and it seemed that he really did care what these people had to say. I was shocked! After all the "angry mob" media reports, you would think every person at these town hall meetings were crazy lunatics, hell-bent on 'disrupting' discussion. But as I saw here, people are just MAD and they have a hard time controlling themselves if they don't feel heard. This congressman did not feed them a bunch of bull like other congressmen have, and soon the crowd seemed to calm down and people asked their questions. It was a very productive discussion.

It makes me proud to see people stand up for their right to be heard.