Dick Morris once again lives up to his name on Fox News. Somehow in Morris' pea brain, Louise Slaughter not wanting to put up with Birchers and birthers and tea baggers at these town halls where the astroturfers have gotten the wingnuts whipped up in to a frenzy is just like the "old Southern politician" who doesn't want to deal with the African Americans in his district. Yeah... that's just the same Dick. How come I didn't make that connection after hearing what she said? Project much?
He makes sure he gets in some more death panel, the government is going to kill grandma fear mongering before it's over as well. Republicans... now the great defenders of Medicare. That's rich.
MACCALLUM: Well, not every member of Congress thinks that facing down voters at town halls as part of their job creation -- job description, I should say. Democratic congresswoman Louise Slaughter is one of those. Listen to what Louise had to say.
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REP. LOUISE SLAUGHTER (D), NEW YORK: I'm not doing town meetings. I'm -- I'm not going to give those people a forum. I went through it with the Clinton health care bill, with the John Birch Society, where we had to have police around and people were hysterically crying. I'm not -- and frankly, to tell you the truth, Ron, my own dignity and the dignity of the office I hold is important to me. And I know what that is. It's not a spontaneous uprising of my constituents. I've got the best relationship with my constituents anybody could ever even imagine.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
MACCALLUM: All right, Congresswoman Louise Slaughter, I should say. Dick Morris joins me now. He's the author of the book "Catastrophe." Dick, what do you make of that? She's saying, you know, Look, I have a great relationship with my constituents. It's beneath the dignity of the congresswoman, she says, and the dignity of her office to subject herself to the folks like we just saw in Waco, Texas, who have something to say.
DICK MORRIS, DICKMORRIS.COM: She reminds me very much of the old Southern politicians, who were racists, who used to say, Oh, I have a great relationship with people in my district, the black people in my district. And they didn't call them black. And if only the outside agitators would leave them alone, I'd have such great relationship with them.
The point is that -- that the -- Ms. Slaughter's constituents want to speak to her. And how else are they going to do it? This bill is going to go through the House without debate, probably be everybody'll be given two minutes to debate the bill. It'll probably pass in a week's time. The committees didn't hold hearings on it. There have been no public hearings on the issue. And then they're probably going to try to jam it through the Senate not only without debate but without even permitting debate by getting it through on a reconciliation with 50 votes.
So how are people supposed to speak out?
MACCALLUM: Yes.
MORRIS: Here they're slicing half a trillion dollars from Medicare.
MACCALLUM: Yes.
MORRIS: They are literally redistributing health care, taking it away from the elderly and giving it to people who are younger and richer and healthier that just happen not to have insurance at the moment.
MACCALLUM: You know, Dick, you're touching on something very important here, and I want to get into it a little bit with you, and the congresswoman, as well. Is there an emergence of this sort of us versus them mentality that we're seeing now in a new way, thanks to, you know, cell phones and all of the exposure that these folks are getting, where they're actually confronted -- you know, there's a sort of elitist notion that we're hearing from -- not all but from many congressmen and women who seem to feel like, you know, they don't want to deal with the actually folks who have something to say to them.
MORRIS: Yes. It's my sworn duty not to talk to them. It's below the dignity of my office, as I think Ms. Slaughter said. Well, whenever it gets below the dignity of a congressman's office to speak to their own constituents -- these are not outsiders. These are not Washington lobbyists. Those she'd probably talk to. These are people who go to a local town hall meeting in her district, voters in her district, and it's beneath her dignity to meet with them and to listen to what they have to say. It's absolutely incredible.
But you're right, it is an us versus them mentality, and it runs throughout the whole health care bill. It's the point I make in "Catastrophe." The elitists who are running the health care reform effort in this country believe that we spend too much money in the last year of a patient's life.
They believe that we spend too much money on health care for the elderly, so they want to cut it and they want to redistribute it to health care for others. But they don't want to admit that they're going to do it. So they set up a commission that's going to do it after the bill passes, and it'll be told to come up with $500 billion of cuts, but they won't tell you what they're going to be.
Then when the commission recommends them, Congress will have 60 days to vote it up or down, can't amend the bill, just up or down. And if they don't vote it down, it automatically takes effect. So this whole thing is a sort of elitist attempt to try to emasculate Medicare while nobody's looking and nobody can do anything about it.
