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| Home Front: Politix |
| Hundreds greet health-care reform bus |
| 2009-08-10 |
| More than 1,000 people turned out on a steamy Saturday afternoon in Raleigh to voice their opposition to President Barack Obama's efforts to reform health care. They were there to mark the final stop for the "Hands Off My Health Care" bus that made 30 stops and traveled 1,370 miles across North Carolina over the last six days. Along the way, organizers said, they collected more than 10,000 signatures on petitions and encouraged more than 25,000 phone calls to Democratic U.S. Sen. Kay Hagan. Dallas Woodhouse, program director for Americans for Prosperity, the free-market organization that sponsored the bus, said Saturday's crowd was one of the largest on the tour. Teenagers, young adults and senior citizens cheered and held up signs that denounced socialism, higher taxes and the national deficit. "The people who [House Speaker] Nancy Pelosi calls monsters and fanatics I have found to be some of the most genuine people I've ever met," Woodhouse told the crowd. Brent Ellmers, a surgeon from Dunn, said protestors oppose proposals being considered in Washington and want to suggest other ways to lower insurance costs. "There is nothing in the current plan about malpractice tort reform or insurance reform to make insurance more affordable," Ellmers said. "There is nothing about tax incentives for employers. The cost for the current plan is tremendous." Lawmakers are considering several reform plans. "People from all over the world come to the U.S. for care because we have the best in the world," Ellmers said. "We don't need Washington bureaucrats telling us what kind of care we can have and when we can have it." |
| Posted by:Fred |