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UPDATE August 18 from the Northern Virginia Tea Party - -

“Our Recess Rally is at Gerry Connolly’s constituent office located at 4115 Annandale Rd # 103, Annandale, VA. Saturday August 22 at 12 Noon to 2pm. We are calling it a Citizen’s Town Hall. Since Gerry Connolly is cloistering
himself away from real questions, we will be taking  your questions to him. Also, we will have a surprise guest at the Citizen’s Town Hall Recess Rally to go along with our 15 foot tall Tax Pig.”

 Obamacare: How Elusive Is House Democrat Gerry Connolly?

The Northern Virginia Tea Party plans their next event at Gerry Connolly’s district office in Annandale on Friday, August 28^th at 12:30 p.m.

The Tea Party organizers wrote that they wanted “to send a message loud and clear to Congressman Connolly that our concerns with this legislation will not be ignored.”

Meanwhile RedState’s Brian Faughnan declared here yesterday that “Gerry Connolly (D-VA) Hides From His Constituents.”  Here is blogger Faughnan’s take:

“Congressman Gerry Connolly is the president of the Democrats’ Freshman class in the House.”
. . . . . . . . . .
Connolly’s only ‘August recess’ meeting takes place at the very end of the recess - in September, in fact. It’s unannounced. It’s in a gated facility. And the gated facility is a community of retirees - who are probably less likely than others to record the session and upload it to the internet. And it’s being held at the extreme west end of his district, rather than in the densely-populated D.C. suburbs that form the heart of his constituency.”

Of course, one wonders why the opponents of Obamacare are not making appointments for freedom-oriented health-reform experts to speak at retiree communities.  As Dick Morris points out here - -

“The most ominous signal yet for the Obama health care plan emerged in the poll by Scott Rasmussen released today. While public support for the plan fell to a new low (42% support, 53% oppose — down five points in two weeks), the elderly emerged as the strongest opposition group. Those over 65 rejected the plan by 39-56 while almost half — 46% — said they were ’strongly opposed’ to it.”

Former Fairfax County Board of Supervisors chairman Connolly is quoted by CBS News (via RedState) here - -

“Connolly said that the White House wants to ‘preserve as much fluidity as possible so that they can inject themselves at the appropriate time in the legislative process.’

Dissident Democrats have proven to House leaders that they have the political capital to affect the bill, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) recently said she would consider increasing the threshold for those would see a tax increase.

‘She has been kind in listening to the freshmen,’ Connolly said.

He added that he and most of his colleagues want to find ‘a path of getting to yes’ in voting on the proposed legislation and urged insurance companies to find a way to contribute to the cost of reforming the system.”

We believe the operative phrase is “a path of getting to yes.”

What should constituents realistically expect from “progressive” members of both Houses of the Congress? 

Carol Negro writing in the American Thinker last May sets out her view of “What the Progressives Want” -

“Growing government is the real reason Progressives are pushing socialized medicine. They know perfectly well it doesn’t work. They are neither blind nor stupid. They don’t care about your health, or what healthcare costs you now, or about rationing or low quality care. No arguments about the inadequacy of government-run healthcare will move them. Socialized Medicine grows government, and gives it total power over our bodies. They will literally, with the stroke of a pen, have life and death power over every single person in the country. It doesn’t get more totalitarian than that.” (Underscoring Forum’s.)

Perhaps Representative Connolly no longer sees himself as part of a “progressive” group.  Last year, however, he had “a passion for progressive values.” Time will shortly tell whether he has come to a better mind.  Clearly he is not a “Blue Dog” member.

Mark Steyn goes to the heart of Obamacare here - -

“It’s floundering because Obama sold it initially on the basis of ‘controlling costs,’ and then the Congressional Budget Office let the cat out of the bag and pointed out that, au contraire, it would cost $1.6 trillion, and therefore either add to an unsustainable deficit, or require massive tax increases, or (more likely) both.”

All of which is true. But to object to the governmentalization of health care on that basis implicitly concedes the argument that, if we could figure out a way to bring the price down, it would be fine and dandy.” (Underscoring Forum’s.)

And Steyn expands on how- -

” . . . government health care ‘redefines the relationship between the citizen and the state in a way that hands all the advantages to statists — to those who believe government has a legitimate right to regulate human affairs in every particular.’
(Underscoring Forum’s.

Nonetheless readers and Tea Party participants should get up to speed on the details of Obamacare and freedom-oriented alternatives here.  As the Obama Administration and its Congressional allies make the health-insurance industry the demon of the month, a pertinent resource today is Heritage’s “What If Auto Insurance Was Subsidized And Regulated Like Health Care?” here.

Ranking Republican Energy and Commerce Committee member Joe Barton, in his minority press release, gave us an insight into the snares concealed in the bill ” - -

“The question of whether government officials could order states and cities to provide insurance coverage for anything from abortions to hair plugs was outlined starkly in two questions posed by the committee’s ranking Republican, U.S. Rep. Joe Barton of Texas, to the Democrats’ staff attorney:

Barton: ‘Is it true that if we don’t strike this and the bill stays as is, the federal government could withhold grants from states if they didn’t comply with some of the mandated requirements for health coverage of their state employees?

Democratic counsel: ‘Yes.’

Barton: ‘Is it true under the provisions of the bill if not struck or amended that if the federal government required abortions to be covered, a state would have to do that or lose grants?

Democratic counsel: ‘If the secretary, acting on advice of the benefits advisory commission, had made abortion a minimum benefit for any acceptable insurance package, yes, sir. They could withhold that.’”

Texan Barton also warned in the minority press release about future action - -

“But wait, that’s not all. The 60 amendments that were still pending when the session ended will be considered in a separate bill in September, said Waxman.”

Northern Virginians who may be able to meet with the good Mr. Connolly might once have gotten a sneak preview of his style by listening to the video of how he conducted the May 19, 2008 hearing on the renewal of the lease of county property to the Islamic Saudi Academy.  As we wrote a year ago in June:

“Security and religious-freedom advocates had wanted the Academy’s curricula independently scrutinized. But Board members vied with each other at the May 19 meeting to belittle the concerns these advocates raised.”

That video is no longer available on a Fairfax County site; apparently the county displays them for only a limited number of months. Suffice it to say that even-handedness was not the then-chairman’s strong suit that day when he held the gavel.

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