Last week, I visited a friend in northwest Arkansas at the same time one of that fine state’s members of Congress, Sen. Tom Cotton, had the misfortune to hold a town hall meeting in Springdale.
Cotton, a Republican, courageously stood in front of a hostile crowd for a couple of hours and attempted to answer questions about the Mexican wall, the repeal of Obamacare and other hot-button priorities of the Trump regime.
Even though Arkansas is blood red down to the sports uniforms of its beloved Razorbacks, nearby Fayetteville is a university town, similar to another university town we’d passed through the day before, Austin, which conservative Texans (pretty much all of the rest of them) refer to as the People’s Republic of Austin. It’s where the liberals in those states tend to cluster.
In other words, they are bright blue dots in oceans of red.
Cotton might have expected – and probably did – the kind of rowdy, sign-waving, chanting and yelling he experienced. But he showed up, stood his ground and did his best to answer the questions.
Of course, the crowd behavior was instantly condemned by the right. What short memories they have! Was it only seven or eight years ago, as the Tea Party rose, that any politician with a D by his or her name could count on a similar ambush at any public appearance?
Why, yes it was!
It wasn’t just Cotton’s appearance that shook that memory loose. Sen. Claire McCaskill came to Jefferson College in Hillsboro Friday for a listening post session about pension shortfalls. Eight years ago, she was at the college to get public feedback on the proposed new health care law to be known as Obamacare.
She got the Tom Cotton treatment – unruly behavior and people shouting, “Liar!” when she tried to answer questions.
Interestingly, as Cotton was meeting up close and personal with his constituents while on a Congressional break, members of the Missouri delegation instead chose to conduct something called “tele-town hall meetings,” where calls are taken over the telephone or the internet.
I’ve never attended one of these, but with screened questions from far away, tele-town hall meetings probably have all the spontaneity and excitement of, say, cleaning out your septic tank. You’re pretty sure of what you’re going to find.
So, who are these brave souls who face the music in front of a computer screen?
I’m talking about U.S. reps Ann Wagner and Blaine Luetkemeyer, both of whom have chunks of Jefferson County in their districts. Jason Smith, the third Congressman with a piece of Jefferson County (the only county of the 114 in Missouri so divided) did not have any public appearances listed on his website, either in person, online or telepathically.
The great irony is that complainers at these live meetings in 2017 are mirror opposites of the 2009 disrupters. They are demanding to know what Republicans are going to do for Americans who will lose health care coverage if Obamacare is repealed without something to replace it.
What goes around has indeed come around.
Town hall meetings as political theater are not new. Neither is attempting to control the narrative by removing unscripted, unexpected questions. Barring live human interaction is a pretty effective way to do that.
During McCaskill’s 2009 meeting, two rowdies were removed from the Jefferson College Field House by law enforcement. Doing that the first time they cross the line is a fine idea, like a grammar school teacher sending the first obnoxious kid on day one to the principal’s office. It shows you mean business and helps to keep order.
The problem is, that’s the piece of film that gets shown on television and online, and no one wants to be the one who decides when the line gets crossed. They may be trying to protect the other attendees’ right to actually hear, but they’ll likely be accused of abridging the protester’s First Amendment rights.
If common sense is applied, it should be fairly obvious when to step in. As the late Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart said of pornography, you’ll know it when you see it.
Trump supporters say the protesters are paid professionals, probably funded by billionaire lefty George Soros. It’s hard to imagine all of them are.
With 20 million Americans insured under the Affordable Care Act, it’s not too much of a stretch to think quite a few of them are both 1) worried about losing it and 2) not on the Soros payroll.
It’s also not too much of a stretch to ask that our inside-the-Beltway Congress members might actually show up in person to meet with the real people who put them there. It’s reasonable to provide enough security so that the people who want to ask questions and hear answers can actually do it.
But, please, ask them of live people like Sen. Cotton did, not some computer screen.
Show some guts, Ann and Blaine. And where are you, Jason Smith and Sen. Roy Blunt?
