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invisible
08-09-2013, 03:54 PM
Anyone else attending August's town halls, and either calling out or thanking their Congressman on the Amash Amendment vote? If so, please post your experiences (and video if you have it, unfortunately my camera is broken) here.

On Tuesday, I attended the town hall of Tom Cole. I'm used to speaking out at these type of events. Over the years, I've attended zoning boards, city councils, and town halls in several states. I've never seen anything like this is my life! People are pissed! Got there an hour early and was one of the first people in the door (wanted to get a good, visible spot front and center so that I could be called on for a question, and so the room could hear and see me when I addressed the Congressman). Upon entering, someone was handing out flyers that had a bunch of the Congressman's quotes on it. They were all embarrassing, shameful stuff. When the room was about half full, a couple of JBS guys showed up, and started setting out copies of the Freedom Index booklet at every seat. FrankRep would have been proud. I knew it was going to be an interesting evening. The guy behind me had a copy of "Atlas Shrugged" with him. There ended up being about 150 people in attendance. Cole entered right on time and began speaking. One of the first things out of his mouth was an attempt to head off any opposition on the Amash Amendment with the standard "national security / terrorism" drivel. He spoke for about 10-15 mins, and then started taking questions.

I managed to snag the second question: "You voted for obomba's agenda, you voted with nancy pelosi, you voted against the American people and against the Constitution when you voted against the Amash Amendment to the recent defense appropriations bill. Any justification for this on the grounds of "national security" or "terrorism" is an invalid excuse, given that a study from the National Safety Council shows that 8 times as many Americans are killed by police officers than are killed by terrorists. Mullins and Bridenstine voted the right way on this issue. Why didn't you?" Of course, despite the wording of the question, he went right back into the standard "national security / terrorism" drivel. Claimed that it wasn't a partisan issue. Said that he was glad to have the police officers that we do. Claimed that no government programs were being abused against the American people. Said that he checked this program out very carefully with all his buddies on the various defense and intelligence committees, and that they had all assured him that what they were doing was Constitutional, and that he trusted these guys completely. Said that Snowden should be prosecuted. Claimed that it was the Supreme Court's responsibility to determine what was and was not Constitutional, and that if it wasn't Constitutional, the Supreme Court would have said so. I was floored. This guy sure stepped in it, bigtime, but he quickly moved on to the next question.

A couple questions later, a girl in the back called him out further on his response to me. Stated that the people he trusted, like clapper, were all lying and that they should all be fired. Referenced the MIAC report, and said that the overly broad definition of "terrorism" included almost every American citizen, and that our government was declaring war on our own population and he was doing nothing to stop it. Called him a liar, that virtually every government program was abused in some way, and that even as we sat there, a Reuters story was just released saying that the NSA had shared their information with the IRS. His response was to repeat the "national security / terrorism" mantra.

Several more questions later, another guy commented on how we're losing our freedoms, and how the communist countries were becoming more free than our own. Said that we used to mock countries like Russia and China for tracking and collecting information on their citizens, and now we've become exactly what we used to mock them for. Said he was disgusted by what was happening to our country, and that we needed to do something about it by following the Constitution again. Cue "national security / terrorism" again.

Half a dozen questions later, another girl in the back called him out still further. She said that her parents were immigrants from eastern europe. Said that she had seen this all before as a child living under communist rule. Talked about how the effect of knowing the government is listening was to chill dissent and political speech. Talked about fear-mongering. Talked about the separation of powers, said that you didn't need the Supreme Court to interpret the Constitution, that anyone could plainly read it, and that it was his job to make the laws in the first place. Again, like a broken record, "national security / terrorism". It was like listening to one of those dolls where you pull a string and it repeats a phrase.

Eventually one older lady got up and said something like: "I'm proud to be living in the reddest of all the red states. Does anyone else here know what it means to really be a "progressive"? All we've heard from this man tonight is a bunch of progressive big government liberalism. This guy isn't really conservative at all. My question isn't for him, it's for all of you. Who here has the courage to run against this man in the next election?". Cole's response was to attempt to defend his record by saying that it was nice to have principals, but that nothing would ever get done without compromising them. I unfolded my "Freedom Index" booklet and propped it upright so that he could see it. About half the audience also either did the same, or held them up and started waving them around.

It was a very beautiful evening. I was quite surprised to see so many of "us" there. All of the above mentioned speakers got lots of cheers and loud applause. After 3 hours, I had had enough after a 12 hour workday, and left before it was over. There were perhaps a couple dozen people left in the room at this point, and nothing further of substance was being discussed. I got several "thumbs up" on the way out. The "MIAC report" girl in the back stopped me, thanked me for speaking out, and wrote down a web address for me (see below). The cop stationed at the door gave me a nod and a smile, and thanked me for coming. It all felt really good. As I said, I've never seen anything like this happen before (usually people just sit there, and rarely if ever speak out about anything of substance), and I've been to many of these things over the years.

I do have to give Cole a good amount of credit. From the start, he claimed that he would stay as long as people had questions, that he would answer any and all of them, and he would make himself available afterwards if anyone wanted to talk with him privately. Nothing was scripted, and there was no attempt made to control or screen the questions. I give him an "A+" in this regard, despite almost everything out of his mouth being in complete "fail" and "facepalm" territory.

I took a look at the "MIAC report" girl's website when I got home. Unfortunately, there is no contact info there except a twitter, and I wanted to contact her. (I guess I'm more old-school in this regard. In my time, when you "tweeted" something, it was polite to say "excuse me" afterwards.) Could someone here with twitter please ask her for her email, and pass it along to me here in a PM? Her website is www.oklahomansforprivacy.com Looks like she has a good start on it.

So, has anyone else been attending August's town halls? Hopefully some of you have, and they are ending up being as successful as this one was!

specsaregood
08-09-2013, 04:03 PM
love the jbs crew.

CaseyJones
08-09-2013, 04:05 PM
+rep

kathy88
08-09-2013, 05:18 PM
Made my night!

invisible
08-09-2013, 06:00 PM
Made my night!

The other people there speaking out is what really made my night! You should show up at one of these things, you're outspoken enough that I think you'd be especially good at ripping on one of these clowns.

tsai3904
08-09-2013, 06:04 PM
My Congressman is holding a town hall in a couple weeks. He voted for the Amash Amendment, which I'll thank him for, but I'm gonna call him out on his hypocrisy for voting for CISPA.

invisible
08-09-2013, 06:07 PM
My Congressman is holding a town hall in a couple weeks. He voted for the Amash Amendment, which I'll thank him for, but I'm gonna call him out on his hypocrisy for voting for CISPA.

Excellent! By all means, please let us know how you do!

Carson
08-09-2013, 06:22 PM
Might I suggest taking a video camera.

There are some real keepers of my last congressman. He moved away. (Video) (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6ip_FtFo0s)

He's gone now?


Not a meeting but one of my favorites;


Pete Stark Blows Up Over National Debt (Video) (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjbPZAMked0)

invisible
08-09-2013, 06:26 PM
Might I suggest taking a video camera.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7S0of8588s

He's gone now?

My camera is broken, and unfortunately I haven't been able to replace it yet! Although I didn't see anyone obviously doing so, hopefully someone there was taking video and something will surface on youtube. This event really needs to be on record, it was pretty classic.

mosquitobite
08-09-2013, 06:31 PM
Videos are necessary for the Baron Hill moment...

invisible
08-10-2013, 08:30 PM
So who has a twitter that would be willing to contact the link for me, that I mentioned at the end of the OP? TIA!

Carson
08-10-2013, 08:40 PM
"Half a dozen questions later, another girl in the back called him out still further. She said that her parents were immigrants from eastern europe. Said that she had seen this all before as a child living under communist rule. Talked about how the effect of knowing the government is listening was to chill dissent and political speech. Talked about fear-mongering."

Met her at a TEA Party event. She also had firsthand experience.

http://photos.imageevent.com/stokeybob/thenewera/MergingRussia.jpg

paulbot24
08-10-2013, 10:34 PM
I unfolded my "Freedom Index" booklet and propped it upright so that he could see it. About half the audience also either did the same, or held them up and started waving them around.


That was an awesome story. I particularly like the part with the Freedom Index. It would be interesting if our people adopted this habit at these meetings from now on. Not only as a way to meet others but also as a polite way of letting them know that we are watching, we are growing, and as Ron has said so many times, "We are the future."

tsai3904
08-20-2013, 11:18 PM
Attended Congressman Eric Swalwell's town hall today. There were about 60 people and no more than 6 were under 30 years old.

In his opening remarks, he said he supported the Amash Amendment because the government doesn't have the right to his mom's phone records. He said we can defend against enemies abroad without giving up our civil liberties.

There were about 10 questions before me and not one about the NSA. I thanked him for voting for the Amash Amendment then questioned why he voted for CISPA, which allows internet companies to do what Verizon is doing with everyone's phone records. He went on about foreign governments launching cyber attacks, people going to the atm's and seeing $0 balances, and planes falling from the sky. He mentioned that in an earlier version of CISPA, it was the NSA that would have received our private info and people laughed, but he worked to move the info to a civilian agency. Everyone seemed to approve of his answer.

Not much outrage at this town hall as most people were looking for answers at what the govt can do to help them.