Gingrey is not expecting a volatile audience, according to an interview he granted with MSNBC's Chris Matthews on Monday. The media has shown town hall meetings across the nation packed with protestors of the health care reform, some with flared tempers. Most recently, a man attended a town hall meeting with the President and was armed with a gun.
"I have no fear of it. I've had already five town hall meetings, I have six more planned. I don't plan on wearing a bulletproof vest, in fact, I usually get standing ovations," Gingrey told Matthews.
David Chastain, secretary of the Libertarian Party of Cobb County, is one concerned citizen planning to attend the town hall meeting. It will mark the second discussion Chastain has gone to this week on health care reform. He said he has multiple problems with the proposed bill.
"The entities who will benefit most from this are the health insurance and the pharmaceutical companies," he said. "It scares me. It scares a lot of people."
Kennesaw Mayor Mark Mathews also plans to attend the meeting.
"We always look forward to Congressman Gingrey's Town Hall Meeting in Kennesaw. He has been a good friend to Kennesaw and Cobb County for many years. I look forward to his presentation and the dialogue from residents regarding the critical issues that we are facing and especially an update on the budget and healthcare reform issues," he said.
According to Obama's administration, the healthcare reform should reduce long-term growth of health care costs for business and government, protect families from bankruptcy or debt because of health care costs, guarantee choice of doctors and health plans, invest in prevention and wellness, improve patient safety and quality of care, assure affordable, quality health coverage for all Americans, maintain coverage when a person loses or changes jobs and end barriers to coverage for people with pre-existing medical conditions. More information on the proposed healthcare reform can be read at www.healthreform.gov.
Gingrey told the Journal last week he would vote against the bill as it currently stands.
"If we took sufficient time and worked together in a bipartisan way, probably 80 percent of this current bill we could agree on. We could never agree on the public plan because that is just two steps towards socialized medicine and that would be my reason I will continually vote against it," he said. "If they make a few changes and don't force people to buy healthcare if they don't want it, then maybe I'll vote yes."
Gingrey said he believes a tax break should be offered to those who decide to purchase medical coverage, small business owners should not be required to provide medical coverage to their employees and people should have the right to choose if they want to purchase medical coverage.
Chastain agreed, saying that forcing the public to purchase medical coverage could have disastrous effects.
"If you peel back all the outer leaves of the onion, what we are left with is medical insurance that will be mandatory based on federal regulations depending on what group you fit into. If you don't participate when the law says you're supposed to, you'll be fined," he said. "There will be over 12 million people who probably won't have health care even when they need to based on how the bill is planned. More healthcare insurance means a higher premium."
U.S. Rep. David Scott said last week he supports healthcare reform, but has tried to slow down the current bill.
"I don't have all the answers to health care, nobody does," he said at his office. "But I know for certain we got to find them together."
Scott said he does not want to rush a health care bill. However, when asked if America will see health care reform in 2009, the congressman said, "The system will not survive without it. If not, it will crash and burn."
Gingrey's town hall meeting will be held at 6:30 p.m. on Thursday at the Ben Robertson Community Center, 2753 Watts Drive in Kennesaw.
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