After a townhall meeting last Saturday in Memphis turned ugly, Tennessee's congressional delegation may be re-thinking the notion.
In Saturday's case, hundreds of people jammed a meeting organized by Rep. Steve Cohen that was supposed to address Social Security concerns and veterans' benefits and quickly turned it into a shouting free-for-all.
If that kind of behavior continues, some lawmkaers may re-think the notion of holding a townhall meeting, and that could cost people with legitimate questions a forum in which to ask them.
The talk show culture would have us believe these shouting and shoving matches are purely spontaneous.
Democratic Party officials would like us to accept the notion that these are highly-organized cadres of industry lackeys, some of them even getting paid to show up and be a nuisance.
The answer is probably somewhere in between.
The entire debate is becoming lost in charges and countercharges. And some sketchy types are getting involved-like the folks who brought you the Swift Boat lynching in 2004 are behind Conservatives for Patients' Rights, an Orwellian name for an organization that opposes health care reform of any kind. Their latest ad, called "Squeeze" is playing in some Tennessee TV markets. The ad was recently fact-checked by the independent group Factcheck.org and fared rather poorly.
We also told you about a PRO-healthcare reform group called Healthcare for America Now, and its recent TV ad attacking Lamar Alexander's position on reform, implying he had no sympathy for cancer patients. By the way, Healthcare for America Now is backed by several proreform unions.
Ridiculous. These groups, pro and con, add nothing to the debate but scare tactics, misinformation and outright lies. The chance for honest debate on the id ssue is diminishing iwth each passing day. 
Above you can watch Newschannel 5's story.