Just Another Hot, Steamy August Sunday...

This morning, well I suppose it was technically this afternoon as I slept in, I took a short drive to downtown Cincinnati to go shopping at Findley Market. For those of you that don't know, it is the oldest farmers market in Ohio. I love it because you get to hear the sounds of the city and the people while you support local growers and artisans.

While I was wondering through the market in the 90 plus degree heat, I couldn't help but look around at the people surrounding me. This market is in the Over-The-Rhine district of the city, a socioeconomically depressed area on the edge of the worst part of the city for violence. Looking around, I loosely categorized people into locals and non-locals. The locals we out in force, buying groceries for the week. This is one of the few places in downtown that people have access to fresh fruits and vegetables and quality meats and cheeses.

The non-locals, myself included, like to shop there for a couple of reasons. First, I prefer to support local growers and craftspeople rather than large chains (and I consider myself lucky that I have an option). Secondly, I love the atmosphere of the market. The crowds, artists, music, and people of the city have a certain liveliness in them the I love.

Now, why am I writing about this in my political blog? The reason is simple. The people I were surrounded by today, for the most part, are the reason that I am doing this. I was busy picking out locally grown organic honey while the person next to me was trying to figure out how much food she could afford to buy for her two small children. I have no issue paying a couple of bucks extra for something that I really enjoy. She was buying the bruised fruit because the vendor gave it to her at half cost. This would let her buy more food, although not as high quality food, for her family. She is the epitome of the average American that is struggling to support her family. She is the average American that somehow gets lost in the noise that is so often focused on in Washington.

Now, I do not know this woman personally and will not make assumptions about her as an individual, but while the debate on health care is raging on, she is bartering for lower prices on bruised fruit. Let's assume that she lives in the area, probably within walking distance to the market. Let's assume that if she does, she is most likely undereducated, as is a large majority of the population in this part of the city. On that assumption, let's say that she works a menial job to support herself and her children, again very indicative of this area. Do you think if she can't pay full price for fresh fruit (which is significantly cheaper than most supermarkets) that she can afford ridiculously high insurance premiums?

This is not about this one, specific woman with two adorable little boys. This is about the 500 other people shopping in the market today. This is about people that live in impoverished areas, not only in Cincinnati, but all over the country. This is about all of the people who work hard every day. They show up on time, do their job, and go home without enough money in their pockets to make ends meet. They have to choose between school clothes for their kids or fixing their car so that they can get to work and keep that job. These are the people that are struggling and hurting. These are the people that do not have access to medical care on a regular basis. These are the people that we are trying to help.

Now, let's look at the opposition to health care reform. For those of you interested, check out www.recessrally.com . This website lists town hall meetings all across the country that are going to take place while the Congress is on their August recess. Their tag line is "We the people say NO to socialized health care". Perhaps we should be focusing our energies on education and not health care reform because apparently there is a large population that have no idea what the word 'socialized' means. We'll get to that in a second.

This is the site that people have been referring to in order to get information and are showing up en mass to town hall meetings on health care. Their website says "The Nationwide Recess Rally takes place on Saturday, August 22nd, 2009. If you believe your liberty, your hard earned money and your way of life is under attack through dangerous health care legislation currently being proposed, get to your local Representative office on August 22nd and make sure he/she knows." They are pushing people to show up and accost their representatives to make their voices heard. They "will not stand for socialized, government controlled health care". Fantastic! Everyone can stay home and watch their favorite FOX News program because there is no need to protest since this is not at all what is being proposed!

Speaking of FOX News, their anchors have been encouraging people to go to this website to get the specific locations for their representatives and to go "give them a piece of your mind". I won't even touch that one. Let's look at who is sponsoring the Recess Rally site.

1. Michelle Malkin - contributor for FOX News and author of "Culture of Corruption" (a book on Obama that was released before he had 200 days under his belt)
2. American Majority - They call themselves a "non-profit, non-partisan political training institute". Their President is Ned Ryun - a former Bush speech writer.
3. Sam Adams Alliance - They are "leading a new revolution for liberty." Their President is John Tsarpalas, who was most recently the Executive Director of the Illinois Republican Party.
4. Patients First - They are a project of American for Prosperity.
5. American for Prosperity - They are "are committed to educating citizens about economic policy and mobilizing those citizens as advocates". Their President is Tim Phillips. He is a professional political strategist. One of their Directors is is James C. Miller, a former Budget Director under President Reagan.

This list goes on and on. These people profess to be average, angry Americans, just like you and me, who are fed up with the corruption of the Obama administration and want to let their voices be heard. In all reality, this is a corporately funded group of very savvy political professionals that are using the ignorance of the American people to implant ludicrous ideas into their heads and giving them the ammunition, hopefully only metaphorically, to show up and disrupt any attempt at an open and informed discussion about the policy at hand.

This is the strategy at the moment and it will get progressively worse through August. They are pushing people to show up at events and cause such a disruption nothing gets accomplished. They do not want an informed debate; they want the debate to stop all together. We cannot allow this to happen. We cannot allow the corporate influences to overrun the democratic process. We cannot allow the status quot to remain. We must, as an educated, reform seeking public, stand up and speak out against this blatant attempt at influencing the discussion. If we don't, who will?