Ignorance So Thick You Can Taste It - (Get ready for paraphrasing)

- I'll get this out of the way first: I just got booked (another comic is having me open for him) in China in October. Shanghai and Beijing. I think there's a Jackie Chan joke to be made about Shanghai, but I haven't seen his movies, so I'm not sure. I am anticipating the following though:

1. Going to a food court to see if Americans are trying to force cheeseburger samples on people who are just trying to walk by, yelling, "CHEESEBURGER! COME ON, YOU! TRY SAMPLE! ONLY $3.93."

2. I hear the best Bourbon Chicken is served at the P.F. Changs in Beijing. What's that? Bourbon Chicken isn't an actual Chinese dish? Fine, I'll take the deep-fried chicken feet.

3. Due to the huge time difference, I'm hoping the Olympics are still going on. I've always wanted a gold medal. Really, a gold anything. NO CRAYONS.

-Now to the subject of the blog... I went to a health care town hall on Monday. It was hosted by Congressman Rob Andrews, a Democrat from South Jersey. He and I have the same position on the issue, so I had no reason to ask him questions. I went to observe the crazies who have been on TV so much. Was the media blowing it out of proportion? Not at all. If anything, they're underselling it. But the main reason I went was because usually only opposition goes to these things.

Of course, I'm a little biased here. I think health care should be seen as a public service, not an industry. It is possible to oppose this kind of health care reform in a reasonable way. For evidence, watch clips from McCain's town hall yesterday. He was booed for saying that Obama is sincere in his efforts, and there's just a philosophical difference about the role in government.

Notes from the meeting.

-I arrived 80 minutes early due to Obama's people telling me it started at 5. It started at 6. See who gets $50 from me when re-election time comes.

-Sitting around prior to the meeting, I couldn't tell if I was surrounded by Fox News types, or people from New Jersey. Tough demographics to distinguish.

- A woman from a conservative lobbying group was handing out a packet about how each state-funded health care system has failed, and we need to "leave things to the markets." However, each plan in her packet were state subsidies to private insurance, not a public option. So it was a failure of private insurance companies. Lies, I tell you. Lies. Also, she looked like a royal seaward.

-1,000 people attended.

- Once on the inside, the signs came out. One guy was holding up a sign that said, "ACORN*: No Way!" What? Pick your battles. The DNC was handing out signs to supporters of reform. Some of the opposition got their hands on them too. A guy stood up and yelled, "HEY!" Everyone looked. Then he tore the sign in half in a way that made him look drunk. People roared. They loved it. I turned to the guy next to me, who was checking stocks on his BlackBerry, which told me he was a Democrat, and said, "We're surrounded." For a couple minutes, I actually thought a riot was going to break out. I emailed my friend, Al, and told him to give the eulogy at my funeral, and "be Dick Gregory about it." That's a reference to the Hugh Hefner roast, for the 26 people who saw it. Just then, another person tore a sign, and the people erupted again. Twice! How many more times can they go crazy about a sign being ripped up? Two more. Four total times. Same reaction. Pavlov was onto something.

-A woman sat to my right, holding a huge binder. She looked nervous-crazy, if that's a real thing. She turned to me, opened the binder and said, "I did my homework! Over 1,000 pages! Can you believe it?"

I was thinking, "No you didn't." But I said, "You sure did. Look at you go." She smiled because she thought I might be crazy like her. A few seconds later, a guy with a rat tail stopped in the aisle to my left. He was wearing a shirt that said, "Bermuda Triangle Billiards." She turned to me and said, "I love reading t-shirts. You can learn so much about a person like that."

1. What did you learn? He likes pool. Good info. You two should talk.

2. Either you love reading t-shirts, or you love reading health-care legislation. Not both. There's no intersection on that Venn diagram.

- The Congressman and the president of Rowan University came out and were booed like Yokozuna when he beat Brett Hart. I couldn't believe it. Neither could they. No respect whatsoever. The university president looked particularly surprised. After a few seconds, he let it soak in that he would be a heel for the evening, due to the book-learnin' he's had. He introduced the congressman to even more boos.

- Congressman Andrews began his opening remarks by saying that he encouraged open debate, but didn't want anyone to talk over anyone else or be disrespectful. Just then, a guy in the back yelled, "How about if we say the pledge?" The university president was sitting right in front of me. Me, him and the other guy looked at each other like, "Is this home-room?" I'm pretty sure the room wasn't full of traitors. But we complied. We said the pledge, ordered our milk, then did finger-paint.

The congressman said, "This bill is expensive. I'm not going to deny that. However, it's 1/3 of what we'll spend on paving roads in the same time, 1/7 of what we'll spend on defense... And we know how we'll pay for it. This isn't going to add to the debt." The opposition started booing. They were yelling, "How?" as he was telling them how. He said he would take questions at the mics in the back after his opening remarks were finished. At that moment, there was an exodus to the mics. Almost all crazies, of course. Reasonable people on either side of the debate aren't going to jump up and run to a microphone.

- A woman finished her long diatribe with "I don't want to say what I think about Senator Pelosi, because I'm a Christian," which destroyed everything she had just said. She's not a Senator. In Christianity, a thought and a deed are judged the same. On top of that, why was she bringing up Pelosi?

-People were saying some crazy stuff. The congressman was calm and addressed everything. About 30 minutes into the five hour town hall, I realized that the opposition didn't listen to him. He spoke like an academic. To a lot of these people, he was just "being a fag."

- A guy with a pony tail stood up and said, "I'm Chad Jimenez... I'm a Type A diabetic. I have been for most of my life - 27 years. I've only had insurance for six of those years. But I've figured things out, and taken care of myself because of something called personal responsibility [huge applause] which says that my disease shouldn't burden society!" STANDING OVATION. He just said that people suffering from cancer, heart disease, Alzheimer's, DID, and everything else down the line are burdens. Unbelievable.

Then Chad said, "In closing, I would like to quote one of our founding fathers, Thomas Jefferson." Thomas Jefferson is one of my favorite people who have ever lived, so I was ready to catch him in a misquote. Also, these people are characterizing universal health care as socialism, and using Jefferson as their mouthpiece, while Jefferson instituted the first brand of American socialism - public education. He insisted on it, the damned socialist. Chad continued, "When a government seeks to earn the trust of the public through promises of taking care of them, then said government must fall." The people went fucking crazy. It was like Def Jam. That is what Chad said. I can't find the quote online right now, but Jefferson actually said, "security," not "taking care of them." Jefferson was talking about the British promising security in exchange for servitude. It was Jefferson's call-to-arms against the British crown. It is the exact opposite point that Chad was trying to make.

- A woman wearing a grand American flag shirt - I mean, seriously, this shirt was beautiful, like the other 300 flag shirts in the auditorium - spoke highly of the military for a couple minutes, then said, "So, if you want to reform health care, why don't you make it so all of us have the same health care that people in Congress have?" The people went crazy again. Standing-O.

The congressman looked confused and responded, "That's... what this bill is. It gives everyone access to the same health care exchange network that all members of the federal government have. And if they aren't satisfied with that, they can get the public option."

"Well, I'd sure like to see it!" the woman yelled back, to cheers.

Reason does not work with these people.

- One guy's argument: "10 years ago, the DMV was run by the state and it would take two hours just to get a form. Now it's privatized and I can get in and out in 15 minutes. And you want the government running health care!"

Where to start?

Medicare. VA. Irrelevant. DMV wasn't privatized. It's a state agency whose employees are hired through a government contractor. This, of course, got a standing ovation too. A standing ovation is to town halls as an applause break is to Last Comic Standing.

-"I run a small business. If this bill passes, you better believe I'm going to let my employees go to the public option. So, what happens then?" People cheered. Other people were confused. The university president, the guy to my left, and I looked at each other and said, "That's the point."

The congressman responded, "Sir, the public option is just that: an option. One of the goals of this bill is to ease the burden of health care costs on small businesses. So you could be spared that expense."

"Yeah, but what happens then? You want me to trust the government?" The same guy also chanted, "We the people are the government," at one point. So he's not supposed to trust himself ultimately.

I was flabbergasted. The congressman didn't know what to do either. It's like the guy was saying, "I wish 2+2 equaled 4." And we're saying, "It does equal 4." "But I wish it did too." What?

- "How many of you are angry because you want to know where this trillion dollars is coming from?" Standing ovation. "Fine, then where were you when President Bush wanted 3 trillion for Iraq?" Boos.

- A woman with a Hispanic accent, and great vocabulary was up. "I'm a dissident from a socialist country. I know what socialism looks like..." She was interrupted by rabid cheers. "... And I don't understand why people think universal health care is socialism..." Boos rained on her face. All over. Bukake party of boos. People in my area were mocking her accent. It was the most fucked up part of the night. Until...

- A man spoke about the need for everyone to have health care. "It's important that I don't lose my insurance because I'm HIV+." People started snickering in my section because the guy was HIV+. " That was when I officially recognized that they would not listen to reason under any circumstances.

- Two construction worker looking guys were directly behind me. One was wearing a sleeveless shirt with pictures of both President Bushes, with the words Dumb and Dumber above them (Bush Sr. was really smart). A guy behind him looked, he really did, I'm not just saying this, he looked racist. An old, fat, racist white guy, wearing a "Don't Tread On Me" shirt. He was talking non-sense the entire time. While the congressman was speaking, Racist Guy stood up and said, "I can't take this any more," and began to leave. Dumb and Dumber turned around and said, "I hope you die on the way out." Racist quickly responded, "Ditto," oblivious to the fact that ditto means he hopes he dies as well. Not the same as "You too."

- One of the last questions I heard was from the woman with the binder, who was sitting next to me. "I have several points to make. Then I have a question... Congressman, I remember you from high school... You were elegant[I think she meant eloquent] then too... I was a nurse... Genetic disorder... [8...8... 8 minutes later... 8 fucking minutes... 8 agonizing minutes later] which brings me to page 23 of the bill. And I quote... The president has the right to appoint death panels..."

Yep, the woman next to me was the one to bring up death panels, actually pretending that it's in the bill. Everything she was was refuted. But she still insisted it's in the bill. "I've read the bill. There's nothing like that in the bill." But it is. "It isn't." I'm still waiting for a congressman to say, "Why would that be in the bill? Why would democrats want to kill the sick and elderly? Why would the party who gave us Social Security and Medicare want to kill the sick and the elderly?" That would shut them down.

*ACORN did nothing illegal or even unethical. When they submitted voter registration forms with names like "Scooby Doo," they had to. If someone fills out a voter registration form, you have to submit it. Otherwise, you're committing fraud yourself.

I don't have anything funny to end the blog with. Pretend someone just farted.