Senator Ben Cardin Visits Salisbury University Part III

Cardin's Non Town Hall Meeting

If you weren't of the less than one hundred people invited to Grey Shore meeting at Salisbury University with Ben Cardin, you're out of luck. Senator Cardin won't be hosting a health care Town Hall style meeting on the Eastern Shore. He will be in Eastern Europe instead. Cardin is a Commissioner on the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe (the U.S. Helsinki Commission). When asked, his spokeswoman, Susan, said he already had three town halls in the state. Just not here, on the shore. "Not before Labor Day. It's just impossible due to time constraints. He'll be in Europe."

The tightly controlled event was heavily guard by the Salisbury Police Department. There were no less then 8 uniformed officers at the event. Outside, a group of nearly 50 people held signs in opposition to the health care bill. They opposed the closed door venue and were upset that they were denied access to their representative.

Questions were to be submitted in advance. Memo Diriker, of Salisbury University organized the event back last May and thank goodness he did or we may of not had the chance to hear Cardin's views on health care."I'm not here to sell you on a bill." the senator said. "because we don't have a bill yet." The senator went on to explain we must do something about rising healthcare costs. That 46 million Americans don't have healthcare and he characterized this as uncompensated care. "We pay for it" he said.

The senator said there was a lot of misinformation and ignorance out there. He said the common themes of the health care bills that are currently be circulated are "bringing down the cost of health care" and "prevention and wellness) He said to get the public option one must take care of heart disease, take care of diabetes, obesity and "smoking problems. "When you go to the ER, they can pull up your records." Mr. Cardin insisted he would "not support a bill that's not fully paid for in 10 years." He claimed the bill doesn't cover illegal aliens but would "help anybody that reasonably needs health care".

When people were able to ask questions, the Senator got some push back. One elderly man asked who are those 46 million people without health care? Cardin claimed 300 a day loose their health care in Maryland. He said of the uninsured most of them are young people who decide not to buy health care. The second group are between 50 and 60 years old and don't qualify for Medicaid. When asked about about the health bill being constitutional, Cardin said the constitution gives the legislation body the authority and "we opted for larger government."

Cardin added he wanted the bill to include dental care in this bill as there is no prevision for it currently. He thought he could get that done under the preventive medicine initiative in the National Task Force.

The polite crowd was left hanging as Cardin apologized for being unable to answer everyone's questions and added that he believes in Town Hall Meetings. "This is not a Town Hall, but we will be back on the shore." The senator mentioned he was leaving for Ocean City, to meet the Health Commissioners from the different counties. He also said he hoped to enjoy the beach. He was then escorted out of the back of the building by the boys in blue.

So if you want to catch your representative of the United States Senate, grab your bathing suit and head to the beach.

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