GranolaBox

A couple weeks ago at the behest of Moveon.org, I attended a town hall meeting at the Potter Town Garage with Congressman Eric Massa.

Yes… the Potter Town Garage. It was very difficult to find, and I was looking for a Town Hall instead of a town garage. I saw a few official looking cars headed in the direction I’d just come from, so I followed them and ended up at the Garage.

The guys in the shop had it all cleaned up nice.

And it’s a really kick ass shop. Kudos to the foreman.

I got there pretty early and I was glad because I really got to soak in the atmosphere.

There was a large mix of people.

You could easily tell which side some folks were on.

The Congressman is against the President’s Health Care plan because it doesn’t provide for a true single payer plan and is too corrupted by the insurance industry.

He also feels like its being rammed down their throats to quickly. The Democrats have opened a can of whoop ass on him because he’s not falling in line, and the insurance industry is trying to meet with him day and night.

He’s one of the few Congressmen that have actually read the bill.

He also feels it doesn’t address a lot of the abuses of the insurance industry.

People on both sides spoke passionately, and Mr. Massa listened to everyone and answered their questions, mostly with no-bullshit answers. Mr. Massa did a great job of dismissing a lot of mindless paranoia about health care and other topics.

I agreed with Mr. Massa, but I felt that the compromise bill being worked up was something I could live with. Then I read Matt Taibbi’s article in Rolling Stone, and now I’m swinging back to Mr. Massa’s position. Any reform plan that doesn’t contain a single payer option is bound for the same abuses of the old dysfunctional system.

I was very impressed with Congressman Massa. He’s independent, which is important because we have a very divided district on a lot of issues. He’s resisted pressure from many different directions and has truly reached out to us to get our opinion, and we’ve given it to him. His town hall meetings have lasted as long as five hours.

He’s a far cry from our previous Congressman (I can’t speak his name… he’s like Valdemort) who, in his waning months wouldn’t speak to an assembly of his constituents.

Kudos Mr. Massa!

Filed under: Politics on September 1st, 2009