5th of November Healthcare Blogumentary

It's hard to follow up after a video introduction that good, but somebody has to pull this blogumentary together. I am the other half of FlemingandHayes, Shane Hayes, fellow Massachusetts resident and rarest of political breeds, the Bay State Republican. We're trying something new here with a duel media tag team article, hopefully you'll like it.

Before I delve into the into the events and reasons behind this great protest down in Washington yesterday I just wanted to again thank Anthony Cote for inviting us to write on his site and giving us the opportunity to try something different.

Now back to the “Congressional House Call” protest in Washington. As Angel mentioned above we indeed did storm congress. Not just the two of us, but tens of thousands of us. If you think that number is an exaggeration, I'd have to inform you that estimate comes courtesy of that bastion of right wing propaganda, the L.A. Times. Those are some pretty good numbers for a Thursday afternoon protest that came with only a weeks notice.

It was on October 30th on Sean Hannity's show that Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachman referred to the Pelosi health care bill as...

“the crown jewel of socialism”

I'm sure everyone had their reasons for going down. As Angel mentioned a moment ago she wrote hers down here the other day, as did I here. (Please give them a look over when you get a chance.)

I am a firm believer that the squeaky wheel gets the grease, and I think it's about damn time that the true patriots among us, those whom in the past would never take a day off of work to go protest are showing up in greater and greater numbers. For far too long our elected officials have been overlooking the wills of their constituents in order to appease special interest groups solely based on their nagging presence and the threat of bad press. I don't know about you, but I think that when even left wing papers like the L.A. Times are publishing accurate crowd estimates, that's bad press you can't even pay for.





Well thank you Angel, had I not drawn the short straw and our rolls were reversed you'd see that even the most reserved among us can blush. I cannot put into words the deep level of respect I have for this young woman and her convictions. It's only in our videos that I can begin to impress upon you the energy level and passion Angel has. I'm humbled to have her as an Oscar to my Felix. Now Angel has it right when she said that we've been talking on Facebook for quite some time and we did decide to meet for the first time on the red-eye out of South Station in Boston. Because if you're going to meet someone for the first time, why not give it the horror movie atmosphere. That's alright, we Irish know how to defuse any socially awkward situation...CHEERS! Oh, and every conservative in Massachusetts can share with you war stories of expressing their beliefs in the wrong crowd with disastrous results. It's one thing to have a few beers in the snack car, it's another to vocally point out the irony of travel by one government subsidized failure of a program (Amtrak) in order to prevent the inception of another. I'm willing to bet that had something to do with the two of us getting shut off prematurely.

What Angel doesn't mention is that she is 100% the reason I attended this protest. As you're probably gathering from watching these videos is that Angel's passion for this country and for our constitution is wasted on text. Every night since Bachmann called for this protest Angel has been talking about going to Washington, and by talking I mean jamming up my in box over it. I don't want to start recycling an old post but I was on the fence until she basically told me,

“What are you going to tell your kids someday when they ask you what you were doing when the republic fell?”

Well there's a level of patriotic guilt no man should have bare, so I made up my mind to go. I should also mention that I couldn't fall asleep the night before we left until I had my bag packed and by my front door for the next day. Angel started packing hers while I was on my way to South Station, but in my defense I was only an hour and half early. As for the ride itself I was shocked to see Amtrak actually get us to Washington on time, but then again we all remember what they said about Mussolini.

We got to the Capitol around 8:30am hours before the protest was to start and found a few hundred people spread out, rearing to go. This gave Angel and I some time to spread out through the crowd to see just what kind of people attend a midweek protest on less then a weeks notice. I cannot express to you the caliber of the people we met. These were not the “angry, racist”, “swastika carrying” “rednecks” the left has accused protestors of being. These were good people from every corner of America who just wanted to have their voices heard. What could possibly be more American then that? One such man, Chuck Warner from Texas, whom I hope gets a chance to share this site with his sons, explained to Angel and I the current dangers in the financial system better then any politician or “expert” I've seen on television. This isn't some right wing extremist with nefarious goals, he's just a good man who loves this country. We'll get back to Chuck later though, as our paths kept crossing throughout the day.

You're probably wondering about that absolutely bizarre steel drum music from hell. Honestly, I don't know what to tell you. Granted this was the PA system our side was supposedly setting up, but nobody seemed to want to take credit for the playlist. Now we all had a good laugh at the thought that someone on up high was trying to intimidate us. While that notion was amusing at first, when the reality that capitol security guards were armed with fully automatic assault rifles. The jokes ended.




No one at that protest will argue the fact that congress needs security, no matter what party is in charge. Here's a question, the president is the most heavily guarded man in the world, no one doubts that, however when was the last time you saw secret service agents that well armed? Exactly , you don't. Anyone would recognize that would send the wrong image. With that in mind, who gave the order to arm the Capitol security guards with assault riffles and told them to stand in plain sight, and why? The reason, intimidation. Congress just sent us a sterner message then to the Iranians. I mentioned our paths kept crossing, and vocalized our shared outrage better or earlier then our friend Chuck Warner. Usually I'm normally not one for shameless self promotion, but I'm a man of my word.












I can understand Angel's passion in wanting to get this part of our adventure out, but I want to take this just a tad slower then she did. Now Michele Bachmann's plea for us to raid congress was easily my favorite part of the rally and should be watched by all. Needless to say we grabbed our piece of the bill, which I honestly thought was the table of contents, it wasn't, I just can't read "hack".

Angel and I looked at each other, looked at the capitol office buildings and we were off, as was everyone else. I only wish it was possible to impress upon you the sight of thousands of people in line at every building at every entrance. It took us about a half an hour to get through the line to get into Rayburn office building. While standing around we joined in chants of “kill the bill” that ECHOED from street to street as we completely shut down congress trying to find our representatives offices. This was like Mardi Gras for patriots.

When we got inside, I witnessed one of the funniest moments of the day. Anyone who's been to Washington or has seen a political movie can imagine what the inside of Rayburn looked like. Marble and Granite everything with heavy oak doors and we literally watched men in suits dodge from room to room, quickly running down staircases, the fear of God in them. The site of actual voters looking to engage their elected officials in debate had men and women running for the hills.

As we've teased for two days, on to Barney Frank. I had teased the video of Frank retreating from some little old lady the other night, but I promise that's my only video from inside his office. Now I know I have a much smaller roll then Angel in this, and I'll happily stand by what she has said. If ever the day would come where I'd have to swear that on a bible I wouldn't hesitate. I should explain that the moment we stepped up to Frank's receptionist I kept my mouth shut. I don't live in Franks district so I didn't want to give that man or his staff any excuse to eject the both of us. Just imagine what it's like to sit behind closed doors with Barney Frank for a moment. Picture all the things you'd love to say to that man, then have that opportunity and not take it. I can only equate it with being alone in an elevator with Obama and him asking you how his “hope and change” is working for you.

To back up Angel the comment that Frank made about democracy was in the context of his recent reelection. He made a comment about if he was so bad why did he just get reelected with 68% of the vote. A question I'd like answered too, I'm looking at you district 4... for shame. Anyway Frank had made his comment about his 68% and said that

“we have a democracy in this country and...”

I used the "…" because Angel saw her opening and took it. We've all seen the videos of Barney Frank playing the intellectual bully, almost picking on people, Angel saw his mistake, cut HIM off and corrected HIM. Anyone who saw the video of Frank vs. O'Reilly from last winter can imagine the expression that man made. As Angel tooled him on the "oligarchy" point I swear to God he had a dear in the headlights look on his face. It was at that point he was beyond rude and dismissive, playing with scraps of paper on his desk and pretending to read the paper.

Angel had it right when she explained how pathetic his “calling the police” was. Honestly I could have had better results dialing 911 on my cell phone. We were both in absolute awe at just what a sad little creature this man really was. I'd also like to point out that his office is COMPLETELY covered with pictures of himself and president Obama. Now I was there when the officer came in and Frank started barking orders. I was definitely right there when he called her a "bigot"-so was an entire office of patriots waiting to give him a piece of their mind. I handed out cards, and I hope those witnesses make it to this site to share what they heard.

I do have possession of the video of the officer and Angel in the hallway. I'm not releasing it until I get the green light from the lawyers that we're not going to get in trouble for releasing it and I certainly don't want COTErack shut down for hosting it. So for that you're going to have to wait. Again there was a crowd all around us. I handed out cards and secured the permissions of everyone featured in that video, except the officer. I do hope these people check the site and please leave a comment below saying what you witnessed. I don't want to get too into detail about the officer, aside from again backing up everything Angel had to say about the incident. Think about it. If you're reading this site, chances are you read the news too, we don't have to make up stuff like this.

I didn't tell her I was going to do this, but, looking through the news, I can't resist. Nobody is going to doubt for a second that we were the only two people that got to meet with Barney Frank yesterday, thus making Angel the only person in the nation that gave Barney Frank a piece of her mind. I'd like to share some quotes about the protest from Frank.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Democratic Rep. Barney Frank took a dig Friday at the Republican lawmaker who organized a protest by conservatives against health care legislation.

Frank, a Massachusetts liberal, told an audience: "Some of the people (at the rally) that wanted to engage me in conversation appeared to have been the losers in the 'Are you smarter than Michele Bachmann contest?"'

It sounds to me as though Angel got under the man's skin a bit. A horrifying thought I know, but I think that anyone in this great nation that has a bone to pick with congressman Frank owes this young woman a beer.

Now as for one last matter of business. The people that got arrested under VERY similar circumstances to Angel (and probably I) at Nancy Pelosi's office. This is the rather funny video of the gentleman that organized the sit in, the way he gets the crowds attention is pure genius. Does this sound like some ultra right wing pro-lifer? I don't think so at all, you can read the slanderous news story from the AP here.



Well this was our first attempt at a mixed media blogumentary, we hope you liked it. If you do, please leave a comment below, if you don't, well all the more reason to leave a comment right?

I know anyone that followed the protest is going to be wondering where all the speeches are and I promise they are coming. No one including I was expecting the dozens of speakers they had so that will be a post for another day, as well as a “best of the chants” video.