Dispatches from a “Town Hall”: Where is the Left?
DAVID DUHALDE
Late Thursday afternoon, a staff-wide email went out to my union office. Rep. Niki Tsongas (D-MA) would host a town hall meeting on healthcare in Chelmsford the coming Saturday morning. Recent reporting about the congressional forums across the country sparked my interest, and I couldn’t miss the opportunity to gauge the nature of these events myself.
The event was moved to City Hall from a supermarket because of expected high attendance. As my vehicle approached the driveway the five cars in front of me all turned in to the parking lot. Right then I realized that not only would I not get into the town hall, but the gathering was as popular as it would be polarizing.
Seventy-five people stood in front of me in line to enter when the police announced that no more would be allowed entry to the 300 person, standing room only event. The elderly couple behind me took this as Rep. Tsongas not wanting to hear debate. The wife said they should hand out a petition for people saying they’d never vote for Tsongas again. Her husband reminded her, however, that they never did cast a ballot for Tsongas. While I question the couples’ event planning experience, they were awfully sweet and made sure to wish me well before they departed.
Unable to attend the forum, I scanned the crowd to hear debate. There were nearly 250 people dying to enter. Of them, I saw only a handful of labor activists. There were several dozen people I assumed were with Organizing for America (Obama’s political operation). The vast majority seemed to be conservative activists, but I use the term “conservative” loosely. These people seem less interested in slow change; they appeared more as the right-wing populist and reactionary wing of American politics. Some might think it even unfair to lump them with the mainstream Republicans. But since when does the GOP care about fairness?
The atmosphere was poisonous. There was no real debate outside. Conversations consisted of ill-informed reactionaries dialoguing with the compromised left. The right-wingers used their nonsensical talking points around “Obamacare” support of euthanasia, rationing, socialism, fascism, etc. Good progressive people (although I didn’t hear anyone for single-payer, much less socialized medicine) attempted to win over the other side. I saw one young filmmaker engaged with five anti-reform activists for nearly twenty minutes. He went up against arguments like “fire departments should be privatized,” “what’s wrong with the system now?” and “I don’t have healthcare or want it.” Afterwards, during asking him if I could get a copy of the film another gentleman came up to us. He said the man who said he did have insurance actually got care from the Veterans’ Administration! I guess he loves socialized medicine, but needed to hide his affections around his conservative buddies.
The anti-reform crowd’s attitude towards organized labor was both negative and funny. I saw two union brothers from the IBEW being heckled by a man. The conversation concluded with “oh, you’re union” to which one replied “yeah, and proud of it!” The reactionary then curtly replied “look at what UAW did to Detroit.” He left before anyone could respond. I later saw him waving an anti-socialist sign. Clearly this capitalist never knew that the autoworkers union had no share in management’s power to design and produce cars that few wanted to buy. What was humorous, too, was the same group that argued with the filmmaker went around asking “where are the union people?” when I was standing right behind them. Evidently, they were totally unfamiliar with my bright purple shirt clearly reading “1199 SEIU.” My height (I’m only 5’3”) and only slightly husky frame must have thrown their “union thug” stereotype for a loop. It reminded me of a comment I heard on staff with YDS: “you kinda small for a union guy.”
The two major problems at this event were the noxious atmosphere and the near complete absence of the radical left. Aside from one comrade from Democratic Socialists of America, I saw no people advocating change who were actual socialists. Sadly, there were nearly a dozen LaRouchites. They were probably the event’s biggest advocates of labeling Obama a Hitleresque leader and equating his healthcare team with National Socialism eugenicists.
Without a visible socialist presence, the arguments for decent healthcare reform fell upon the Obama supporters and a handful of universal coverage activists. With no socialists engaging the crowd, the Obama people were the political left. That’s a problem. I also remembered my bitterness at self-righteous radicals from my college days – the people who would berate social democrats and liberals as sellouts, but always be conspicuously absent to battle a conservative. At this gathering, I would have certainly welcomed any revolutionary there challenging those reactionaries. I’d have settled just so someone loudly calling for socialized medicine as in France, too.
I wish I’d been more vocal at this event, but I was practically alone in my beliefs. I agree with the recent piece by T. Shelton on the Freedom Road Socialist Organization’s website that it’s time for us to stop blaming Democrats for progressive agenda setbacks such as the water downed Employee Free Choice Act. Even if Obama criticizes the liberals who attacked Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NB) for having a lousy position, as a former community organizer the president should remember he needs an organized left demanding more. That will, as much as we hate to admit it, enable some decent reform to happen, even if it’s not single-payer. Until we stand up and get heard, the Palin wing of American politics will destroy another chance to make the lives of working and poor people better.
I respect you for going, David. You’re absolutely right that the left needs to turn out for these events.
One question, however: do you live in this member’s district? If so, then no problem. I’m curious because I have heard reports of people on the Right coming from hundreds of miles outside of the district. Some might say to fight fire with fire, but I tend to prefer the high road. What do you think?
Good question Ben.
Tsongas is not my representative. While she may not be my congressperson, I still felt I had every right to go. That being said, I do think her constituents had more of right to be in the event than me. I, however, didn’t stop any of them from going because I couldn’t get in either. I took the high road, but not out of my making.
Like any good political meeting, the fireworks outside sometimes beat the opera inside. I think anyone was in their fair jurisdiction to be in the parking lot and debate. That’s American democracy.
I enjoyed this piece, but I don’t think the problem is that hordes of radicalized activists are just staying home plotting some insurrection instead of engaging with actual people. The problem is there is virtually no political far-left in this country— obviously the movement needs to be built somehow, I don’t think that the far-left does a terrible group *mobilizing* the scattered forces we have today. Look at the radical influence on the national anti-war movement.
The whole town hall thing really just exposes how insubstantial capitalist democracy really is and how reactionary political sentiments are in large swathes of the country. If there is a major “counter-hegemonic” movement in the USA it belongs to the political Right. Evangelical community churches, NGOs and political groups have even made significant inroads into the military. Right-wing commentators get a large audience for fringe politics and the Republican Party has shown itself to have many “radical” currents.
Flash back just decades to the New Left when there were hundreds of underground left-wing newspapers in the armed forces, a mobilized student population, higher union density and public support for initiatives like Medicare, environmental protection, etc.
The Right has been successful in recent decades— it was perhaps wishful thinking to assume that Obama’s victory represented a total repudiation of the political Right in favor of a social-liberal political consensus.
I agree with all of your paragraphs except for the first, Bhaskar. While the left is pretty weak, lamenting this fact will not get us anywhere. We need to recognize that the left DOES exist, and it has won significant victories. I would refer you to Bill Fletcher’s article in the last issue of the Democratic Left.
It can be found here on page 11:
http://www.dsausa.org/dl/Spring_2009.pdf
I do not think the only problem is that the radical left is absent from the town halls. Many of these areas might not have any real presence of such organizations. The absence, however, is a problem. Especially since this is an excellent opportunity to promote your beliefs. I feel the need to direct my criticisms at such “revolutionaries” who are not present when you need them the most. We need less inner attacks on the liberal-left and more fighting the right-wing.
Well, I’m attending a town hall here in a couple weeks. Now that I’m working at a college in Appalachia, I expect an interesting dynamic. You have union folks, but they’re largely blue collar types (UMW is still around, and there’s a bunch of other energy-related unions like USW and IBEW) who were already mad about cap-and-trade (a horrible bill, but for different reasons, and that’s another topic) and probably not ready to fight against their right-wing neighbors. I think the best thing to do is to give people plenty to chew on later. Why do we want to subsidize the same industry the Dems are criticizing instead of actually fighting it? Why do Medicare recipients yell “hands off my healthcare!” when the gov. already pays for it. It all makes my head hurt. I just want people to contemplate these ridiculous contradictions more.
Great piece on another single-payer advocate’s experience at the town hall…
http://dissidentvoice.org/2009/08/a-socialist-attends-a-town-hall-health-care-meeting/
I think the finger should be wagged not at those that may be to the left at us, but those to the right… the liberals who accepted debate in terms of the public option and abandoned any mention at single payer even though they believe that’s the ideal solution. News from today makes it seem like the White House is very willing to accept a plan without the public option. Isn’t that what normally happens with lesser evilism?