Town hall showed local passions

Seven months after protesters turned a Tampa town hall meeting upside down, the health care reform at the center of the chaos faces its test in Congress.

The town hall meeting, featuring U.S. Rep. Kathy Castor, revealed jagged divisions that would be repeated at gatherings across the country, raising questions about whether change is possible.

The August meeting in Tampa also made celebrities of a few people caught up in the drama - a man whose shirt was nearly ripped off, a woman who appeared to be slapping a man.

How do these people who played fleeting roles on the national stage view the issue today, as it nears its climax?

Castor, a Tampa Democrat, was hustled away soon after the meeting started, unable to be heard over the shouts of "Tyranny, tyranny," and "Shame." Health care is her signature issue. She supports reform and will join in this weekend's vote.

She had no comment Friday, though, on the town hall assembly.

The state representative who organized the meeting, Betty Reed, a Tampa Democrat, said it changed her approach as a politician.

"Sometimes you get so wrapped up in the nuts and bolts of something, you forget to think about the people out there who don't know what you're doing," she said.

But the man who left the meeting with a ripped shirt, Randy Arthur, said he feels the same as he did, suspicious of government, perhaps more now than before.

"In August, I thought what they were wanting to put into place was not good. Now I know it's not good," he said. Arthur owns an air-conditioning business in Oldsmar.

He's especially disgusted by the deal-making and procedural maneuvers the House is using to pass the bill. It's using a process called "deem and pass" that limits debate. He knows Republicans have used the same tactics but said that doesn't make it right.

"They're all corrupt. They all need to be thrown out."

Reed organized the meeting in August with the help of the Service Employees International Union. They were trying to rally support for President Barack Obama's health care reform proposal.

But in addition to supporters, hundreds of critics showed up. Unable to get seats and complaining that union members got the best spots, people began to jostle and yell outside the doors. When an organizer tried to close them, Arthur and others tried to stop him.

Tampa police said someone guarding a door slipped and grabbed Arthur's shirt as he was falling. Arthur said it was no accident.

"He was pulling pretty hard and cussing me."

Arthur's picture in his torn shirt showed up in the news across the country. He considered filing charges but changed his mind, he said.

Soon after, the attention died down and he tried to forget about it.

"My focus is on staying in business," he said.

He still follows news about the health care process but concedes he doesn't know everything that's being proposed.

There are no provisions for government-run health care in the plan, but he still thinks the government will impose controls of some kind that will interfere with his coverage.

As a business owner, Arthur has a group policy and pays $2,000 a month for coverage for him and his wife. He doesn't see his costs dropping if the proposal passes. And if it does, he's sure his taxes will go up.

"I didn't like the bill then, I don't like it now," he said. "I'm not one of these tea party people. I'm a conservative, and I don't like all this spending."

Reed met with a few of the health care reform opponents after the meeting in August, the ones who were not in the spotlight.

"I wanted to know what we did wrong," she said. "We had a good talk. They said the problem was that no one was listening to them."

After she explained what she knew about the reform proposals, they were still opposed, she said.

"It's not a perfect bill," she said.

But it meets the needs of most of her constituents, she said.

Many are poor and recently unemployed. A lot suffer from diabetes diagnosed when they were working and now considered a pre-existing condition.

"They need medicine they can't afford," she said. "People who are unemployed will be able to have insurance in this bill."

She knows it came together with a lot of "back and forth," and people don't like that.

But she thinks this is the best Congress can do right now.

And to her, it's now or never.