Rep. Brian Baird (D-WA) received a fax containing the Obama-as-Joker picture and this message: "Death to All Marxists! Foreign and Domestic!" The Secret Service may now be investigating it. That and other political news in today's TPMDC Saturday Roundup.

Yesterday in 100 Seconds: Kids These Days

August recess not quite as sleepy as we thought.

With the escalating standard of Republican craziness and whackadoodlism over recent days, I'd been wondering if Sarah Palin would feel pressed to get back into the game, if for no other reason than to defend her brand as chief Republican moonbat.

And I think my question has been answered.

Palin is now out claiming that Obama's "death panel" might decide to euthanize her Down syndrome baby.

Full-size video at TPMtv.com.

We're gliding toward the end of a long week here at TPM HQ. And in one of our free-ranging all-staff skype bull sessions I mentioned something I'd hardly remembered, which is that not long before I started TPM during the November 2000 Florida recount, I'd actually briefly did a sort of proto-TPM on the website of my then employer, The American Prospect.

I guess maybe Cro-Magnon or Neanderthal TPM.

I only had a hazy recollection of it and hadn't thought about it in ages. But through the magic of the Internets Andrew Golis pulled it up in seconds on the Internet Archive. This appears to be the first post, from August 10, 2000. I'd forgotten how similar it looked to the original TPM site and even the name ("Washington Memo") was pretty similar.

In any case, I only hazily remember it. My only real memory is why I stopped. I remember starting to get calls from HQ up in Boston (I was the Washington Editor at the time) with various complaints about how what I was writing was too edgy or unprofessional or funny or I guess just too interesting. So I figured WTF and basically just stopped. Later, after I started real TPM, they started picking it up back on the Prospect site in a sort expurgated, lam-ized edition. But not long after that I was on my own.

Apparent Teabag voice mail to SEIU headquarters tells union folks to "calm down [and] act like American citizens" or "come up against the Second Amendment."

Meanwhile twittering tea-baggers call on fellow baggers to bring firearms to health care town halls.

We've gotten quite a few emails on the issue of tea-bagging nomenclature. This one though sort of stood out for us. Our main takeaway being that there seem to be at least a few reasonably hip right-wing activists ...

I am not a "Tea Bagger" or a "Right Wing Activist" and my like-minded community members are NOT either. Please, to be credible, you must get your facts straight. I may have performed the "Tea Bagging" procedure in my own sexual life but do not perform it at public forums (maybe you have wishful thinking for your own selves possibly not having experienced that method?) What I do do is practice "Tea Party" style activism based on the principles created by citizens from our own history and protected under the First Amendment, which also protects you. And, although, I appreciate be compared to a "Right-Wing Activist" I must say that I do not meet that criteria. I am a middle class woman, I run a family of four and a small business.

Read more »

Grassroots activist and "just a mom" at town hall turns out to be GOP official and former staffer for candidate who the host of the town hall, Rep. Steve Kagen (D-WI) beat last year.

We had a number of emails last night discussing how much of what we're hearing from the right now should be considered incitement. There are numerous instances of anti-reform advocates explicitly comparing President Obama's health care plan to the Holocaust, for instance -- jumping from the hideous and outrageous claim that reform means euthanasia and going from there. We get desensitized to this stuff. But it's worth taking a moment to give that a long think -- comparing the president's reform plan to the Holocaust.

Most significant here is not the right-wing liars and demagogues making this stuff up but the fact that they've convinced a significant number of their followers that this stuff is true. That's a very dangerous situation.

Read more »

Senate extends Cash for Clunkers program. That and the day's other political news in the TPMDC Morning Roundup.

Yesterday in 100 Seconds: The First

The reports from the ground are still sketchy. But in both cases of unrest this evening we appear to have a similar pattern. Relatively small venues (200 to 300 size spaces) get quickly filled to capacity. The doors get closed because of fire codes. And then locked out teabag activists start banging on doors and windows demanding to be let in and yelling about various forms of political oppression. From what I can tell, the shoving and whatever fisticuffs took place grew from that.

In post-event retellings on the right fire code enforcement became a form of political repression of teabaggers.

More broadly, there's a more general pattern -- escalating mayhem and near-riot behavior from teabaggers escalating into physical confrontations. Already, not surprisingly, right wing websites are attempting to blame these developments on pro-health care reform advocates.

Late Update: I have an unconfirmed report that what touched off the outburst at the St. Louis event was that after the doors had been shut, two SEIU employees who were staffing the event (SEIU was a sponsor) came to the door and were allowed in. This provoked the teabag contingent, who believed this was prima facie evidence of discrimination against their political views.

Video of this moment after the jump ...

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This time it's in St. Louis at an event hosted by Rep. Russ Carnahan (D-MO).

According to the Post-Dispatch there were at least six arrests. And the only person identified in the still very sketchy reporting appears to be a reform proponent rather than a teabagger.

The backstory to this event appears to be a local Tea Party group which pushed for large teabagging contingent which in turn brought a big pro-health care reform crowd.

Late Update: I'm not sure quite what it means but the article just posted by the Post-Dispatch does not mention the arrests and apparent shoving matches noted in the paper's earlier flash reports from the scene.

From tomorrow's column by the Post's Steven Pearlstein ...

The recent attacks by Republican leaders and their ideological fellow-travelers on the effort to reform the health-care system have been so misleading, so disingenuous, that they could only spring from a cynical effort to gain partisan political advantage. By poisoning the political well, they've given up any pretense of being the loyal opposition. They've become political terrorists, willing to say or do anything to prevent the country from reaching a consensus on one of its most serious domestic problems.

We're getting a series of videos from the townhall down in Tampa. Here's one video from one of the entry ways into the venue as the organizers were trying to shut the doors -- apparently because they were over fire code capacity.

And some of the chants from inside, as reported by the St. Petersburg Times ...

[Rep. Castor] pressed on, mostly unheard among the screams from the audience of more than 200.

"Tell the truth! Tell the truth!"

"Read the bill!"

"Forty-million illegals! Forty million illegals!"

The spectacle at the Children's Board in Ybor City sounded more like a wrestling cage match than a panel discussion on national policy, and it was just the latest example of a health care meeting disrupted by livid protesters.

TPM Reader JG reports in from the event ...

I was at the riot/townhall tonight since it was about half a mile from my house and I'm always down for a freak show. I also attended the April 15th tea bag party down the street. This was the same audience, very old and very white (half the minorities I saw were in the media, literally). They did indeed close the doors--I stayed outside because I wasn't about to be trapped in with the nutters for three hours. They started to chant "move it outside" and were infuriated about being somehow left out. I heard some people make the comparison that if they can't run a meeting how can they run healthcare? (Is this the next meme?) It never ceases to amaze me seeing medicare recipients holding up signs saying "Just say no to government run healthcare" and there was plenty of that.

Read more »

The early reports are sketchy. But apparently a mob of teabaggers began to riot after some were not able to get into a townhall meeting in Tampa.

"As the building filled to capacity, angry protesters stuck outside began to scream, yell, and chant," reports local TV channel 10 in Tampa. "At one point, those trying to get inside began banging on windows as Tampa Police officers quickly spread out guarding all entrances."

A reporter currently inside the venue says at least one fist fight has already broken out.

Late Update: The event was hosted by Rep. Kathy Castor (D-FL).

Later Update: We're getting overlapping reports. The Tampa Tribune reports to instances of "shoving and scuffles." It seems like at least one incident occurred in cases where teabaggers trying to force their way through the doors after event organizers manning the door were no longer letting more people in. Reports also suggest the teabag crowd was organized through Glenn Beck's "9-12 Project."

Still Later Update: Here's a page from the Tampa912 group's Meetup page. Discussions leading up to the event. Some whacked statements, all pretty far right, but mostly pretty garden variety, people getting charged up to hit the event and give their member of Congress an earful. Poke around. See what you find.

So Damn Late Update: Video from a local tv station after the jump ...

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Robert Reich surveys the America's verdant fields of astroturf on his cross-country journey.

Just out from Business Week ...

As the health reform fight shifts this month from a vacationing Washington to congressional districts and local airwaves around the country, much more of the battle than most people realize is already over. The likely victors are insurance giants such as UnitedHealth Group (UNH), Aetna (AET), and WellPoint (WLP). The carriers have succeeded in redefining the terms of the reform debate to such a degree that no matter what specifics emerge in the voluminous bill Congress may send to President Obama this fall, the insurance industry will emerge more profitable. Health reform could come with a $1 trillion price tag over the next decade, and it may complicate matters for some large employers. But insurance CEOs ought to be smiling.

Read the rest here.

Sorry to say it's come to this. But it appears that the latest Birther Obama Kenyan birth certificate forgery trainwreck has spawned a full-fledged intra-birther civil war.

Full-size video at TPMtv.com.

I've been wondering for a while how it is that a former health care exec whose company got smacked with the biggest fine in history for defrauding Medicare is managing to be the public face of the opposition to the president's health care plan.

And now a CNN anchor of all people seems to be wondering too.

Haven't seen a smackdown like this on the cable nets in some time. Watch.

Director John Hughes has died unexpectedly of an apparent heart attack at age 59.

First, Birther Queen Bee Orly Taitz released a purported Kenyan birth certificate for Barack Obama. Then reporters discovered that the Obama 'birth certificate' was actually a forgery based on the birth certificate of an Australian man, David Bomford, who was unfortunate enough to have uploaded his own birth certificate onto a family genealogy website during the summer of 2009 America birther mania.

Now Taitz is accusing him of having forged his own actual birth certificate in order to discredit the phony Obama birth certificate that was in turn based on his real birth certificate.

Hard to know what the guy did to deserve this. Next thing you know Taitz's birther mob will be storming Bomford's next townhall.

Judge Sotomayor confirmed 68-31.

Even World Net Daily can't get onboard with that fake Kenyan birth certificate (citing its "investigative operatives in Africa").

As Politico puts it, lobbyists were just getting back on their feet after the initial Obama whirlwind and "regaining [their] natural place in the business of Washington" when those darned forged astroturfing letters went and messed everything up again.

FreedomWorks, the main group behind the townhall teabag mob scenes, has now released a new "August Recess Action Kit".

Across the street from our office, some people have just taped a big paper sign on their balcony that reads "@cliffbot: twitter is down"

John Edwards' former mistress appeared this morning before a federal grand jury in North Carolina that's investigating his presidential campaign's payments to her.

Or to put a finer point on it, Rielle Hunter arrived at a federal courthouse in Raleigh, NC, where she is presumed to be testifying before the grand jury that Edwards has acknowledged is investigating his campaign. What a mess.

Video of Hunter arriving here.

Sonia Sotomayor will be overwhelming confirmed as the first Hispanic Supreme Court justice (with whatever nod is owed Benjamin Cardozo) when the Senate votes this afternoon. That and the day's other political news in the TPMDC Morning Roundup.

Rep. Todd Akin (R-MO) jokes that some of his Democratic colleagues "almost got lynched" by teabag mobs at their townhall meetings.

Yesterday in 100 Seconds: Welcome Home

Conservative paper cringes at teabagger hooliganism at local townhall.

Threatening phone calls escalate to a death threat for Rep. Brad Miller (D-NC) over the health care bill.

He'll be discussing health care with constituents one on one over recess. No townhalls, which seems understandable.

Former Rep. William Jefferson (D-LA) guilty of 11 of 16 counts.

CNN released a poll this morning showing that 50% of Americans support President Obama's health care plan while 45% oppose it. On a challenge this big those actually aren't bad numbers, though the intensity does seem to be leaning toward the opposition.

But the more interesting numbers were below the toplines.

There's a generational divide hovering around the age of 50, with most people younger than 50 supporting the president and those over 50 opposing him.

Read more »

Full-size video at TPMtv.com.

TPMmuckraker obtains an email from one industry CEO urging his employees to contact Congress to weigh in against health care reform. Just another weapon in the corporate PR arsenal.

The Washington Post has terminated "Mouthpiece Theater," with executive editor Marcus Brauchli explaining: "I don't think the series worked as they intended. It was meant to be funny and insightful ..."

To whatever degree we get cynical and discount prepared statements, this encounter, described in the statement freed journalist Laura Ling read after arriving back from North Korea, must have been quite a moment ...

"Thirty hours ago, Euna Lee and I were prisoners in North Korea. We feared that at any moment we could be prisoners in a hard labor camp. Then suddenly we were told that we were going to a meeting. We were taken to a location and when we walked through the doors, we saw standing before us President Bill Clinton. We were shocked, but we knew instantly in our hearts that the nightmare of our lives was finally coming to an end. And now we stand here home and free."

Like you, I've always wanted my own Kenyan birth certificate. And now there's KenyanBirthcertificategenerator.com where you can have one made up for yourself in just a few minutes.

Here's one TPMer Eric Kleefeld just used it to whip up.

Slideshow: Imprisoned US journalists arrive home from North Korea.

Chuck Todd getting on the Ambinder Social Security battle revisionism train?

TPM Reader JB sends in this clip from MSNBC's First Read from this morning ...

"If you're a reporter who covered politics back in 2005, you know this pretty well: Brad Woodhouse and Americans United (funded by organized labor) helped defeat Bush's Social Security reform. They organized protests, ran TV ads, and held town halls to get members of Congress on the record on Social Security. All of which seems ironic now that Woodhouse -- the current communications director at Obama's DNC -- issued a statement yesterday denouncing the conservative "mobs" at Dem town halls. "Republicans and their allied groups ... are inciting angry mobs of a small number of rabid right wing extremists funded by K Street lobbyists to disrupt thoughtful discussions about the future of health care in America taking place in congressional districts across the country," he said. And now the DNC has upped the ante, producing a Web video, entitled "Enough of the Mob," that conflates these protests with the so-called "birthers.""

I'll give Todd half a loaf on this one. The Social Security supporters who showed up at Bush townhall meetings and those held by Republicans and wavering Dems in 2005 didn't show up for 'thoughtful discussion', to put it mildly. They knew exactly what they thought. They were trying to make the opposition to privatization very clear, make their voices heard, etc. And most specifically they were trying to pin members down on just what their position was because most wanted to fly under the radar and didn't want to face the full public exposure of their willingness to phase out the program.

Read more »

House Dems hold conference call to discuss -- inter alia -- strategies to counter teabag incursions.

We've set up a live wire for coverage of all of the developments in the health care reform battle. The Health Care Ground Game Wire automatically refreshes so you can get all of the latest news in one place. We've also embedded it in the front page news section to the right, so you can check out the most recent town hall disruptions, new ads, dueling press releases, etc, there, too.

Reformers lay out strategy for dealing with town hall disrupting anti-reform teabaggers. Read the memo.

Is Virginia for Birthers?

Laura Ling's emotional press conference after touching down on U.S. soil. Watch.

First, thanks to all of you who've sent in first hand accounts, video and links to press write-ups of incidents at townhalls around the country. We're going to be rolling out a August Health Care Ground War Wire shortly. This is just a note to ask you to keep the tips coming.

And to be clear, we want everything. We're particularly interested in the disruptions, turnout, all the Tea Shirt craziness we've been reporting on the last couple days. But we're just as interested in the mundane stuff. Turnout. Which side seemed to be most represented at different meetings. The whole picture. Details, details, details ...

Senate Republicans won't stand in the way of an extension of the Cash for Clunkers program. That and the day's other political news in the TPMDC Morning Roundup.

Astroturfing is one of those Washington phenomenon that's so ingrained in the political culture that the inherent fraud built into it no longer merits much attention. But those forged letters sent to members of Congress purporting to be from groups opposing global warming legislation have helped shine a bright light in this dark corner. From watching the roaches scurry for cover, we've been able to learn a bit more about how these operations work. Think: white collar sweatshop.

Yesterday in 100 Seconds: Birthday Wish

I wrote earlier this week that in the unfolding drama of the health care townhall teabaggery, conservatives have developed their series of shout-downs and freak-outs into something resembling a right-wing performance art. Still, though, with all the antics and ferocity, let's be honest, it's hard to deny there's a certain Waiting for Guffman, Best in Show quality to the whole scene.

As our team has reported on at some length already, there appears to be a reasonably well-orchestrated national effort to mobilize teabaggers to go and shutdown these townhall events with raucous demonstrations and generally making it impossible for the members of Congress to talk. But that's not the most interesting part of watching this drama unfold.

Read more »

From TPM Reader MN ...

As an Obama supporter and volunteer during the 2008 primary and general election, I can tell you that nothing motivated me more than the prospect of LOSING. I live in NH, and the ground game is important to winning here. If I had expected an easy win, I wouldn't have even volunteered or contributed $1. But I felt like Obama's campaign needed me -- and many others -- to work for him so he could win. I do not feel that same necessity with health insurance reform. Each time the President says "We will pass health insurance reform this year," each time I hear congressman (from both parties!) and pundits predict that, despite recent setbacks, health insurance reform is very likely to pass THIS YEAR, I think to myself, "Ok, he's got this in the bag. He doesn't need me to do anything." I want health insurance reform. And in my opinion, ANY of the bills that have been drafted would be huge steps forward. Ironically, all the progress made so far makes me less willing to fight for it. I don't know what the President can say to get all of us more motivated, but it might just come down to waiting for his back to be against the wall again.

The Worcester Telegram & Gazette reports another Teabagger/Townhall incident up in the Worcester, Mass. This time it was Reps. McGovern (D) and Neal (D) heckled and shouted down several times by unruly Bay State Teabaggers at a townhall event U Mass Medical School.

Indeed, at one point, one heckler started likening Rep. McGovern to Nazi war criminal Josef Mengele, notorious for performing macabre experiments on concentration camp inmates.

But was it just Teabaggers?

Read more »

Is Robert Kaplan calling for the US to impose a peace on Israel and the Palestinians? So says MJ Rosenberg.

Follow my Twitter feed here.

Slideshow: Bill's trip to Pyongyang.

Tea Bag protestors at Chris Dodd's health care event in Hartford call on the senator to deal with his recently diagnosed cancer by committing suicide with an overdose of pills and booze.

TPM Reader JP ain't happy ...

We ARE getting out-hustled. There's an army of us out here who want health care reform, but no one is directing us to voice our anger. I'm tired of writing and calling Sens. Cornyn and Hutchison and getting back boilerplate responses. If Doggett's people announced another Town Hall in Austin, which tilts very left, lots of us are ready to go toe to toe with the brownshirts. But no one's been calling......

Full-size video at TPMtv.com.

The DNC is out with a zinging press release pushing the idea that the Tea Shirt mobs shutting down the Democratic health care townhalls are a latter-day version of the freak show crowds that started thronging the McCain-Palin events in the dying days of the 2008 campaign.

I'm listening to John Bolton explain why Bill Clinton going to Pyongyang to seal the deal on this prisoner release is a terrible thing.

I assume we've made them more powerful than they were before when they were completely unpowerful and marginal.

I don't know about you but speaking just in nationalistic terms I'm totally humiliated.

In upstate New York today, the guy who organized the local Tea Party protest in Rome, New York ambushed Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) and started screaming that Hoyer was a liar. (It's becoming like a sort of right-wing performance art.)

"You're lying to me. Just because I don't have sophisticated language, I can recognize a liar when I see one."

As an example of screamer Don Jeror's populism, he was screaming about corporate taxes, which he claimed had been raised even though they haven't.

Marc Ambinder's up with a series of Twitter posts saying that Democrats ignore the rash of disruptive anti-health care reform protests at their peril. But I'm not sure who he's arguing against.

I take it as a given that it's very difficult to gin up these kinds of mini-riots if you don't have at least a very riled up minority of voters who believe deeply in a specific position. I'm also not sure who is arguing that there's anything wrong with people organizing to get their viewpoint out in a public setting. There's really no such thing as a purely spontaneous upsurge of protest over any issue. As Dave Weigel points out, the traction Republicans are getting in the governors' races in Virginia and New Jersey suggests something real is going on right now. (Along these lines, Eric Kleefeld has good posts today on Virginia and New Jersey, showing in each case big Republican advantages in voter enthusiasm and likeliness to turn out to vote.)

Read more »

Former Israeli Prime Minister and current Defense Minister Ehud Barak says he expects the Obama administration to unveil a Middle East peace plan within weeks and that Israel should accept it.

"In the coming weeks, their plan will be formulated and presented to the parties. I believe that Israel must take the lead in accepting the plan," Reuters quotes Barak as telling the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee of the Knesset.

This raises several interesting questions.

Read more »

Don't have an affair with a woman whose husband is a prolific and indiscreet emailer, especially if he's on your staff. Bad idea.

Democrats in the MN-06 seems to be coalescing around a different challenger to Michele Bachmann (R-MN) than the Dem who almost knocked her off in 2008.

Some rich mockery of the Milbank and Cillizza online videos for the WaPo. Or as the mockers put it: "Washingtonpost.com -- Inadvertently revealing the dark heart of our dying industry two minutes at a time." (via Americablog).

How do we know it's really Obama's birthday?

Maddow looks at the script the teabaggers are using to shutdown those Democratic health care town hall meetings. Watch.

Because you weren't bored enough with it yet, the full Senate begins "debating" the Sotomayor nomination today. That and the day's other political news in the TPMDC Morning Roundup.

Sargent: Are we seeing Organizing for America get outhustled on the ground by the Teabaggers?

Yesterday in 100 Seconds: Lip Service

Looks like another ambush in Wisconsin's 8th district, at Rep. Steve Kagan's town hall tonight at Green Bay. Hard to know precisely how coordinated or spontaneous this was from this report from a local Fox affiliate. But it has the looks of another Freedom Works-cum-Tea Bagger event.

In terms of who's on top of the battle out in the districts, this struck me as the most revealing passage ...

Kagen's staff was surprised by the turnout and tried to calm the crowd before the event. Kagen said he knows everyone is not on board with health care reform, but he's hoping to find common ground.

All the GOP astroturfing aside, it's a little hard not to get the sense that the Dems don't quite have their ducks in a row. 'Surprised by the turnout'? Sheesh.

Late Update: More from the latest tea party/birther riot (from the Green Bay Press Gazette) ...

The vast majority of people attending the event appeared to come in protest of the health-care legislation, and they repeatedly disrupted the event by shouting.

The crowd's size and vocal frustration grabbed the attention of Green Bay police, who arrived soon after the event began to keep the peace. Capt. Rick Demro said no one was arrested.

Kagen never battled the crowd's volume, but voiced his concerns several times about its attitude.

"You can talk, but I can't listen to 100 people at the same time," he said. "This is not a shouting contest. This should be a discussion."

If the event were a shouting match, the mob won. Kagen tried talking about the health-care bill, but the roaring chants deafened his attempts. Several elderly people covered their ears and grimaced at the level of noise.

From TPM Reader NM ...

Just wanted to let you know I watched the Couric newscast this evening and they had a segment on the organic 'anger' that exists against the Obama and the health program. Guess who they has on? A guy from freedomWorks, a republican strategist and Ambinder spouting the line that this is 'real america' anger. So as you said today they are reporting it as spontaneous not as an organized astro turf fight.

They followed this with a segement about hwo shoddy VA care is for soldiers hitting ALL the republican talking points about govenrment run care. A thing of propaganda beauty.

Is this our media? You betcha.

From my Republican pal under deep cover ...

I'm surprised that it's your Republican pal that has to make this point: The precedent on the anti-health care protests isn't Bush's Social Security town hall meetings. The real precedent is the "Brooks Brothers riot" during the 2000 recount. The point is to create disorder, but get the media to cast blame on the underlying issue and NOT the protesters.

That's what happened during Florida: The "blame" was on the "chaos" created by the "unfair" counting methods brought on by Al Gore's call for "selective" counting. No blame was focused on the young GOP activists upsetting the process.

THAT seems to me to be the comparison that Obama supporters should be on the lookout for this summer.

You can say this came from a Republican friend -- but not by name. ;-)

Rep. Kirk (R-IL) tells local news station there are actually only 8 million uninsured Americans -- once you factor out illegals and wealthy people who don't want coverage.

We spent most of Monday reporting on these tea-bagging crowds going to Democratic health care town hall meetings to shout down the hosts and shut the events down. It's classic agitprop, very akin to the 'Brooks Brothers riot' down in Florida during the recount.

But where's the other team?

Folks can whine on endlessly about outfits like Freedom Works putting these rackets together. But if the president's plan has any public support they should be able to get supporters to these events too, right? Not to pull the Black Shirt routine but to provide some public demonstration that there's real public support for making reform a reality.

If there is.

So that's the question. Where's the other team?

Marc Ambinder seems to think the tea-bagger effort to shut down Democratic town hall meetings is just working from the Dems 2005 anti-Social Security privatization playbook.

Really?

I watched those events unfold pretty closely. And what the Dems did in 2005 consisted almost entirely of protest outside town halls and anti-privatization activists trying to get into the meetings to ask questions to pin members of Congress down on their position. What made it so uncomfortable for Republican and some Democratic members of Congress is that they got questions they didn't want to answer.

Did some meetings get heated? Sure. But these weren't organized attempts to shut down the meetings themselves.

Does Marc remember what happened four years ago?

It's probably not too soon to note the thread connecting the Bush administration's practice of only allowing certified Bush-loyal attendees at their town hall events (from the Social Security phase-out day) and what's happening now with these tea-party activists ginned by Freedom Works with instructions to shut down Democratic town halls dealing with health care. From a superficial perspective one might say, well, isn't the point that the town halls aren't supposed to be scripted to a T? You want to get some hustle and bustle, some engagement of opposing views? But as I noted earlier, what the tea bagger mobs are doing is qualitatively different. They're sending in these groups to shut down the meeting entirely.

Both cases are distressingly telling examples of the authoritarian mentality so often found in right-wing politics -- force and mob action to shut down actual discussion. It two sides of the same coin -- the right in power versus the right out of power.

Par for the course.

Full-size video at TPMtv.com.

Here's Glenn Reynolds marveling that tea bag riots keep popping up spontaneously at Democratic health care town halls across the country.

This afternoon's MSNBC appearance by leading birther Orly Taitz tells you all you need to know about the birther movement (and a lot about cable news, too). Watch.

We've been telling you all day about this tea-bagger campaign to shut down Democrats' townhall meetings in districts around the country by shouting down speakers and generally mobbing the events.

Now House Minority Leader John Boehner's office has chimed in cheering on the campaign.

Over the last couple months, every time the Public Option looked like it was in trouble, Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) piped up and said, no, it was still going to be there. And because of his rep for good political antennae and a comfy relationship with business interests, his say-so pushed it back into the mix.

But then, for several weeks, as health care's prospects appeared to deteriorate, he went silent. Now he says he's still confident the bill with have a public option ... or, well, something like it.

Here's how the Bucks County (Pa.) Courier Times described a Saturday meeting Rep. Patrick Murphy held in his district:

Minutes into the first of two scheduled "Congressman on Your Corner" sessions Saturday afternoon at the jam-packed Concerto Fusion restaurant in Morrisville, shouts from an impatient, frustrated crowd forced Murphy and his staff to reconsider the format of the event. ...

Murphy's about-face (in his opening remarks, he specifically told a woman "this was not a town hall meeting") resulted in a 90-plus-minute, frequently contentious Q&A session with voters clearly emotional about health care. But the congressman kept his cool, listening to people's concerns and defending his plans while occasionally asking hecklers "to be respectful."

I think we may have our first example of a reporter who seems to miss the distinction -- noted below -- of activists turning out to make themselves heard at townhall meeting and mobs sent to shut down town hall meetings.

From Sheryl Gay Stolberg in the Times ...

Day One of the Democrats' offensive on overhauling health care apparently did not go well for Representative Lloyd Doggett of Texas, who was shouted down by angry constituents during a town-hall style meeting in Austin on Saturday.

A crowd of what looked like several hundred people chanted "Just Say No!" and "Just Vote No!" and apparently chased Mr. Doggett to his car.

When members of Congress hold 'town hall' meetings in their districts, they should expect to hear from their constituents, many of whom won't agree with what they're selling. And it's not just that hypothetical, unconnected-with-interested-parties 'citizen' we're talking about. But union activists who want to ask about EFCA or health care or right to lifers who want to press the issue of abortion funding.

But here's something to watch closely over the next few weeks.

It now seems clear that 'tea party' movement types, organized by highly-funded corporate backed outfits like "Freedom Works" are putting together a plan to disrupt and shut down as many town hall events as possible. That's entirely different from making sure you've got a lot of activists at events with t-shirts or protesting with pickets outside the venue or making sure one of your activists gets to ask a question.

This amounts to a sort of civic vigilanteism.

But watch closely whether reports covering these events recognize the difference.

Virginians evenly split on whether President Obama was born in the USA.

A strategy memo titled "Rocking the Town Halls -- Best Practices," aimed at the anti-health care reform crowd, suggests disrupting town hall style meetings held by members of Congress: "Stand up and shout."

Read the memo.

One thing we'll be watching. There have already been a number of cases where tea-baggers have shown up in force at Democratic townhall meetings on health care to heckle and shout down lawmakers.

Doonesbury does the C Street house.

August, traditionally, is the slowest month for news. But this month the big political story of the year -- the push for a big health care reform bill -- will be hitting a fever pitch in districts and states around the country. Only the details, the nuts and bolts of it, will be happening largely out of public view -- particularly beyond the reach of the traditional media.

Right now, Democrats and Republicans are fanning out across the country trying to shape and direct public perceptions about the health care legislation Congress will take up again in September. It's quite likely that the fate of the legislation will be determined this month before Congress even comes back into session.

So we want to look very closely at how this process is unfolding: What are members of Congress saying at townhall meetings in their districts and states? What sort of response are they getting from attendees? What are they telling constituents about what they plan to do is phone conversations, constituent letters and in comments to the local press? Which groups are most successfully organizing at the ground level? What ads are running in different districts?

You're there. You know. And you have the ability to monitor and understand these developments the way that no number of national reporters surveying the scene from Washington can.

We'll be updating with more information and specifics. But let us know what you're hearing about townhall meetings in your area, ping us when you see statements your members of Congress are making to the local press. Let us know what your member of Congress tells you about his or her position. We're interested in specifics and details.

How to contact us? There's an email address in the 'comments' link up there on the upper right hand corner of the site. Send us details. We read every one.

With the House of Representatives now beginning its August recess (the Senate has one more week before its break), the month ahead will undoubtedly see an intensely heated on-the-ground and in-the-airwaves campaign over health care reform. We preview the battle royale in today's Sunday Show Roundup ...

Full-size video at TPMtv.com.

Obama reportedly weighing new economic sanctions against Iran. That and the day's other political news in the TPMDC Morning Roundup.

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There is only one Semitic language which is an official language of the European Union. What is it?

Click through for the answer ....

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Frank Rich, on the recent "storm of racial and nativist panic."