TEA Party Has U.S. Capitol Surrounded

Three Key Votes Will Decide Health Care Reform On Sunday

BULLETIN: Late Saturday afternoon, Democratic House leader-
ship announced an abandonment of the Slaughter Solution to
having the Health Care Bill "deemed accepted" by suspending
the rules. The TEA Party's direct action of surrounding the
Capitol worked with flying colors.- The Legendary

Key TEA Party activist Toby Walker phoned from Washington
twice. The first time, about 10 a.m., she estimated 10,000
people had converged on the U.S. Capitol Building.

People were packed so tightly around the door to
Representative Chet Edwards's Sam Rayburn House Office
Building digs that you couldn't get up to the threshold to
look in, she said. Getting through the door was an
impossibility.

Mr. Edwards aroused the ire of TEA Partiers when he vowed
last Monday to vote against the Health Care Reform Bill,
then turned around in mid-week to vote for a bill suspending
the rules.

TEA Party activists interpreted this as a sign he was
setting up a prelude to passage of the bill. Mr. Edwards
later defended his actions by saying that he intended his
vote to allow the House to consider routine and mundane
matters such as proclamations, naming post offices or
bridges and other administrative details while they wait for
the amendments to be approved by the Rules and other
committees and come to the floor for a vote.

When she phoned in about 2:30 p.m., 50,000 TEA Party
protesters had the U.S. Capitol Building surrounded.

There tomorrow, the U.S. House of Representatives will make
history when it votes on three key issues bearing on the
Health Care Reform Act bill, a 2000-plus page plan to take
over the administration and costs of health care delivery to
millions upon millions of Americans who will be for the
first time forced to purchase health insurance if it passes.

The first of the three issues to be considered will be
resolutions governing debate on the matter.

The second will be the package of amendments to be made to
the Senate version of the bill.

Thirdly, the House will vote up or down the bill itself,
according to sources at the Capitol building.

Pass or fail, the TEA Party plans either to party down with
plenty of beer at Crickett's on the Square or hold a prayer
vigil in Heritage Square for the American people if it
passes.