Dissent Of The Day

A reader writes:

What's "uncanny" is both your "gotcha" attitude that these protests are organized (were protests against proposition 8 organized and if so were the protestors just puppets of the organizers?) and your apparent lack of understanding that underlying this organization there is genuine concern among attendees at these townhall meetings, as well as many across the country, of the prospect of vastly more government direction and control of healthcare. You are no more interested in a debate on this issue (as witnessed by your support of equally over-the-top prop 8 protestors) than those that are shouting down speakers at these townhall meetings.

What I was observing was the portrayal of something clearly organized by one political as something spontaneous. As for genuine concern about healthcare, I think that's essential to getting the right answer(s). But so far, all I'm hearing are hecklers, and abstract hysteria about socialism. I have yet to hear from the tea-bagging right how they plan to prevent soaring healthcare costs from bankrupting private industry and decimating the public purse. And I never heard from them about how they intended to cut spending and balance the budget.

Given the lack of substantive alternatives to real communal problems, they strike me as simply a form of emotional reaction to the end of the far right's dominance of American discourse. And that's really a problem for conservatism, not Obama.