From The Front Lines

4:30 p.m. Alhambra Town Hall Health Care Meeting with Congressman Shiff: August 12, 2009

I’m sitting in the parking lot, a poster board and black Sharpie in hand, the radio on Frank Pastori, 99.5 FM. He’s passionately discussing the very current, very urgent Obamacare catastrophe with callers. I am creating my protest poster, trying to zero in on the exact name of this, his latest attempt at World Domination…Nationalized-Universal-Single-Payer-Socialized-Government-Controlled-Health-Care-Insurance-Reform-Thing. I settle on “Obamacare.” I call in to the radio show. My voice is higher than usual and a bit shaky. It takes a lot of energy to protest. All my endorphins are zinging. “Hi Frank…I’m here at the…”

I have a flashback to SNL…adrenaline rushing through my veins, and Steven Tyler just down the hall. My Madonna poster on the wall…I looked at her attitude for inspiration. I told her that once and she said, “…Really?” On a scale of 1 to 10, her exhibitionism is a 150 and mine is a 5. I would have never predicted that in 17 years, I would be sitting in a Honda Civic, head full of super-boring health care facts, watching old people walk by, while squeaking this out on a poster,

“What’s the Rush?” (afraid we’ll read the bill?).

Then, on the other side:

“We Read It & We Say NO OBAMACARE.”

(Then I scribble a little “fishy” on one side referring to the new White House Snitching Program, and I scribble a little “John 16:33” on the other side. Ya gotta have hope.)

What you write on your protest poster is important. It’s like wearing your heart on your sleeve.

As I walk into the gathering crowd, I notice that all the signs are polite, intelligent. No swastikas! Well, there was one poster of Obama with a Hitler mustache that was quickly taken down, but that poster seems appropriate since the two have so many similar qualities; the most recent being Obama purposefully stirring up racial conflict with the Gates-Crowley affair. Hitler did that…stirred up racial conflict. Obama’s current attitude toward Israel is in question. Hitler did not support Jews. Obama is forming a volunteer/mandatory Youth Army. Hitler did that. Obama is trying to have government control everything, the media, cars, banks, houses, health. Hitler did that. Obama appointed 44 people (czars) that we didn’t get to vote for. Hitler did that. Obama started a Snitch Program. Hitler did that. Obama wants the government to control who dies and when they die. Hitler did that. So did Stalin, Lenin and Castro.

This whole thing isn’t about health care – it’s about CONTROL.

When I left the house, Obama was on TV strutting and laughing, “Ha, ha, ha. There is no death panel. This will not cost more. There will be no lines.” I looked at the TV and said out loud, “How stupid do you think we are?”

A big black man approaches me and hands me a booklet with a picture of Hitler and Obama on the front. I ask him, “Are you on our side or their side?” He walks away. Later I realize it’s from the political cult, the LaRouche organization.

I walk over to the conservative area. My friend Kathy is wearing a surgical mask with “Free Speech” written on it. She hands me one that says, “Fishy.” The conservatives smile, laugh, hug and admire each other’s homemade signs and original, clever sayings. We take pictures of each other with our signs. We are shy. This is a new thing. Conservatives never protest. We converse and then shake our heads in concern and look at the grass. We are “well dressed.” Many of us carry American flags. After chanting, “Freedom Yes!, Obamacare No!,” we start singing, “God Bless America,” and “My Country ‘Tis of Thee…sweet land of liberty…”

The liberals are carrying three signs that have been mass-produced and handed out. Craigslist had an ad offering $15 an hour to people who would hold ObamaCare signs. (Maybe they get a bonus if they look like they mean it.) One of their mass-produced signs says, “Thank You Obama.” The others say “Reform Now,” and “Standing Together: Health.” Most of the fake protesters are lifeless, or sitting in the grass bored out of their minds. They don’t smile. Not one of them holds a flag. None sing.

A middle aged business man with no sign approaches me and I smile. He looks at my sign with disgust and says, “You want that forever?” I’m confused but quickly realize he’s an Obamunist.

“I..uh…what?

He says, “You don’t want change?”

I say, “I don’t want communism!” He quickly walks away before we can have a conversation.

That was weird.

We conservatives keep singing. Now we are singing, “You’re a Grand Old Flag.” Then we chant the Pledge of Allegiance. The O’ers continue to slump, lifeless. A few standing O’ers try to start a conversation, their protest posters facing our protest posters. One of them talks to me, “Millions of people have no health insurance.”

How do you respond to that? I want to say, “Um…maybe they don’t work, or they spent their paycheck on booze instead! Or, maybe they don’t plan ahead. Or, are they illegal aliens? Are we, the middle class supposed to financially support the whole world who moves here?” But, I say, “Socialism is bad.”

A movie-star lookin’ guy wearing sunglasses has a poster that says,”Karl Marx Loves Obamacare.” I ask him,”What’s the difference between Marxism and Communism?” He says, “Communism happens suddenly and violently to a country. Marxism is more of a creeping thing that slowly leads to Communism.”

A 60 year old woman with no sign, no flag, and wearing no bra, walks up to me and says, “My insurance is $2000 a month.”

While I’m trying to process that, mine is $100 a month, she says, “I’m dying of cancer and I have no insurance and I don’t know what to do.” She looks healthy.

While my brain is figuring out that she has just lied to me, she walks away.

I say, “Why don’t you go where the illegal aliens go. They get free health care.”

She glances back, the devil in her eye.

Creepy.

This whole protest thing is too much for me. It feels icky. And then, an attractive young couple approaches, “Are you her? You are so brave. Thank you. I’ll pray for you.” The bond of strangers in ‘a time such as this’ is rich and deep and unforgettable. I think of the movie “Reds” but the opposite.

The meeting begins, and with 1000+ people attending, there isn’t a microphone FOR THE PEOPLE. Schiff and a panel of liberals only answer one question from the hundreds of cards we filled out. There is not a balanced discussion where opposing viewpoints are represented. It reeks of ‘propaganda.’ People start leaving in frustration because questions about the 1017 page, intentionally confusing bill are not being answered. No one answered my question, “Why the rush?”

So I answer it myself. Either a) The liberals fear they will be replaced in the mid term elections and Obama’s power will wither. Or, b) The Obamunists are trying to pass it before anyone can read it, like they did before with the Spendulus Bill…but us citizens are on to them now, and we read it.

When I walk to my car with my poster, flag and camera, traffic is at a stand still around the block. An old woman leans out of her car window and shouts to me, “You’re stupid.”

My head swings to the right, “I read the bill. It’s terrible.”

She screams, “No you didn’t or you wouldn’t be…that.”

I shout back, sturdy and strong, “Did you read it?” I’m not afraid anymore.

“…be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.” John 16:33

5 pm. Sepulveda and Santa Monica, Feinstein’s Office August 14, 2009

I attend the Westside Protest at Feinstein’s office. The conservatives are outnumbered. We stand on the street corner and passing cars honk loudly. I turn to the Obamunist next to me, “Why do you want socialized medicine?”

He arrogantly replies, “I lived in Germany. It worked there.”

I say, “Then why aren’t you there?”

He’s tall and proud. “I want to be here.”

A few minutes later, I say, “What do you do?”

He says, “I’m a professor.”

I say knowingly, “Oh, no wonder. You know Harvard used to be Christian. So were all the other Ivy League schools. So was our country.”

He says, “Jefferson wasn’t a Christian.”

I say, “I know. He was a Deist. He didn’t believe Jesus was God, but he loved the Bible and thought our country should be based on Jesus’ teachings.”

I say, “What do you teach?”

“History.”

I laugh, “Oh! Didn’t you learn from history that communism/socialism doesn’t work??!!”

He’s silent.

I say, “What about the death panel/euthanasia clause? (Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, Obama’s health advisor)”

He says, “That’s a lie. Did you read the bill?”

I say, “Yes. And, they will have to ration care…it’s inevitable.”

My friend walks by and says, “Hey Vicki, did you hear, Obama deleted the death panel clause today?!”

I smugly look at my German-loving Obamunist professor and say, “How could they delete it, if it never existed?!”

He walked away.

And, the war goes on.