Yesterday there was a front page story about town hall meetings sponsored by My congressman, Michael Grimm. Grimm had voted for the Ryan plan.
The Congressman showed his colors at a first meeting on Wednesday in Brooklyn, NY, by denying President Bush's role in our current economic crisis and denying that opponents to his policies had any voice as constituents.
There was again yesterday a second town meeting on Staten Island, where the bulk of his constituency resides. This is a "quasi-follow-up" because I couldn't actually get into the meeting but did involve myself somewhat at the venue. The meeting had been advertised in the local newspaper, with a phone number to call (Grimm's office) for reservations - the venue only had room for 375. I don't receive that paper, so I only heard about the meeting later. I attempted to call the number early in the day of the meeting and was informed that there were no seats left. But I went to the site anyway to play it by ear, because there might be a chance for admittance. I also brought along a few signs because I had learned that there would be a protest group forming outside the grounds (about a dozen showed up - including the costumed "Grimm" reaper, mentioned in the local newspaper article about this second meeting). After awhile, I left the protesters and joind a group of about 15 "stand-bys" who were told may be admitted if there were available seats. We all waited patiently for about an hour. When it was close to start time (7 PM), we were ushered to a registration table and told to wait there.
This is where the fun began. A staffer (probably one of Grimm's), kept running into the auditorium to "take a count of available seats", but, there was a constant trickle of latecomers who were registered, and this held up our admittance for about 20 minutes.
Finally the man returned, but his story had changed - there were empty seats, but for security reasons, none of us would be admitted unless we were on the rez list - a list in which all names had been "screened". No "unscreened names" would be admitted. He asked us to think of the Giffords incident to understand why this was necessary.
The discussion between the guy and some of my colleagues-in-line became a little heated about this, as you can imagine, but I was particularly upset by something else. Each and every registered attendee who entered the venue was handed a 2-sided xerox of a WSJ article casting negative aspersions on Obama for the deal with Brazil purported to allow offshore drilling, when Americans were suffering from ever increasing gasoline prices (this has been debunked, btw).
I mean, what business do the "gatekeepers" for a public town hall with a Congressman have in distributing blatant anti-Obama propaganda? I found myself in a heated argument about this issue with another staffer that can only be described as a barroom bouncer type, who, as the redness in his face increased, swore: "It's not anti-Obama, it's the truth" (sounds like: "It's not racism, it's anti-Obama)!" I thought for a minute he was going to haul off and belt me one, especially when I called the article "a bunch of Rupert Murdoch garbage".
Eventually we gave it up and I didn't really get the chance to make any noise in the meeting proper, but I did feel I had done something for our side.
Now, this second town hall has been reported in our local paper and it's interesting how Grimm altered a biggie from the first meeting in Brooklyn:
After thumping President Obama, he said the Bush administration had "lost its way and spent too much" as well. He also called for an end to subsidizing big oil and closing corporate tax loopholes.
WTF? Didn't he just say the night before that thinking Bush had a role in our economic troubles this year was "insane"?
Did that NYT article get to him overnight? And what's this about closing corporate loopholes and ending oil subsidies? I'll believe that when I see it.
At any rate, I can't testify to the extent this second meeting reinforces the meme that congressmen are getting wrath at home for voting for the Ryan plan. I hope the Dems who got into the room gave him the business, but my district is pretty conservative and I'm sure he had many friends in there, as well as at the "registration table".
BTW, we stand-bys took a poll amongst ourselves and there was not one Repub amongst us. We thought it strange that none on the other side missed the reservation window, until someone pointed out that they all probably got personal phone calls from Grimm's list. And I think the admittance policy changed for us after the staffers heard us snarking among ourselves about Republican policies. I think I've learned something from this - keep one's mouth shut until one gets through the door- save the fun for later.