Teabaggers With Guns At Tennessee Townhall!

[BlooInBloo]

The escalation is like watching the old mountain-man game on The Price Is Right. Will we go over? :(

http://campaignsilo.firedoglake.com/2009/08/08/teabaggers-bring-guns-to-cohen-health-care-event/

Steve Steffens at Right Wing Cracker: "Randy Wade is to be complimented as well; he arranged for security. There were actually idiots who brought guns (legally, it seems they had carry permits, but why did they feel they needed them?). Yes, you read that right, and Randy made them all check in with the Sheriff's Deputies on hand.

Gordon G via FDL Event Tracker: "Beginning early in the proceedings many attendees who were clearly against health insurance reform began trying to speak (and shout) out of turn, at times chanting in unison. These bullying attempts were contained by the rest of the crowd, who variously applauded speakers supporting reform, demanded that hecklers behave, and engaged thugs one-on-one to keep the peace."

[onehandle]

1. Guns don't kill people. Gun owners kill people. nt

[BlooInBloo]

2. Not sure the guy who got shot cares all that much.

[rvablue]

3. Important piece of that "contained by the rest of the crowd"

doesn't matter how loud and out of hand the "mob" gets, they are still the minority.

I have a feeling a lot of middle-of-the-road voters who don't have insurance or who have it but are still in massive debt because of illness, are going to start turning away from these people.

If the local media are even modestly honest in their coverage, people are going to start to realize that the disruptors are just a small group of corporate-sponsored thugs. Or one can hope, anyway.

[HillWilliam]

4. It will be their sorry day to find out

that there are just as many Dems who own and can carry. No matter what they brandish, they are STILL a minority.

I. Am. Not. Scared of them. And I refuse to be intimidated. I suspect many, if not most of us feel the same.

[BlooInBloo]

6. :)

[Edweird]

7. +1 Hell, a very screechy and insulting part of the left doesn't 'get it'.

Yes, we are just as armed as they are. I will not be intimidated by these assholes.

[rrneck]

9. +1 nt

[liberalmuse]

5. I guess the RWers need their pocket dicks.

'Cause they don't have anything else to offer.

[marmar]

8. Armed to the teeth......and dumb as a box of hollow marbles.

Bad combination :scared:

[progressoid]

10. Good gawd.

[RamboLiberal]

11. Here's how the Memphis Flyer Reported it

Judged by those precedents, 9th district congressman Steve Cohen did well indeed when it was his turn to take on the issue at a Town Hall meeting, held Saturday in the huge, barn-like confines of the Bridges Center downtown.

The structure was, as they say, filled to the rafters, with several hundred, maybe a thousand or two attendees, the great majority of whom seemed to be worked up to a frenzy, one way or another. Undeniably, naysayers — organized and otherwise — predominated, with high-decibel noise of all kinds, including groans, cheers, and persistent chants of “term limits!,” “tort reform!” and “read the bill!”

-----

One speaker, with a nod to known sports nut Cohen, likened the bedlam in the audience to someone’s trying to hold a pep rally before a University of Memphis-Louisville grudge match and filling the auditorium with both student bodies at once.

At one point, as if to challenge the very fates, Cohen strode down the center aisle amid this cacophony of contending partisans, delivered his response to a question, and, after doing so, returned unscathed to the podium. (That feat, like the relative order of the proceedings, may of course have been enabled by the conspicuous presence of uniformed city and county security officers — yet another credit due to local district chief Randy Wade and the rest of the farsighted Cohen staff, especially since there were unconfirmed reports that guns may have been confiscated from some of those entering.)

http://www.memphisflyer.com/JacksonBaker/archives/2009/08/08/out-of-chaos-cohen-manages-a-bona-fide-town-meeting-on-health-care

[fascisthunter]

12. they need to bring their guns, because they are wusses