• Editor’s note: On Monday morning, The Times-Dispatch held its 26th Public Square at its offices downtown. The topic was health care reform and the crowd exceeded our capacity to seat everyone. The conversation began with presentations from Rep. Bobby Scott, a Democrat from Virginia’s 3rd District, and Rep. Eric Cantor, a Republican from Virginia’s 7th District. Afterward, audience members asked questions and made comments. Tom Silvestri, the newspaper’s publisher, moderated. Below is an edited transcript of the Public Square. To watch the entire event online, go to TimesDispatch.com and type in the keyword “Public Square.“

Leftovers from Monday’s Public Square include these questions received during and after the program: Why the unprecedented 10 a.m. start? It was the only time we could schedule both Rep. Eric I. Cantor and Rep. Robert TOM
SILVESTRI
“Bobby” Scott. Congress is in session, limiting options. Normally, the Public Square starts at 7 p.m. on either a Monday or Tuesday.

There’s been much ado about the death of civility. The impassioned debate about health care reform has added a few highlight films to the archive of bad manners displayed in public places. So it might come as a surprise to some that yesterday morning’s Public Square about health care at The Times-Dispatch was intelligent, informative—and almost unfailingly polite. Given the right forum, Americans can disagree agreeably. That’s especially true in Richmond, as we’ve learned at previous Public Squares.

They lined up early. They listened without booing. And they left in an orderly fashion—without shouting, fighting or the escort of law enforcement. Given the partisan sound and fury in recent town halls on health-care reform, attendees said yesterday’s Richmond Times-Dispatch public forum was just what the doctor ordered. “What you see on TV as far as trying to get messages across from our congressmen has just been a spectacle,“ said Thomas Francis, 66, a retired truck dispatcher from Richmond and one of 225 people who attended the forum at the newspaper’s offices in downtown Richmond.

On the way from the town hall to the public square, a polite and bipartisan conversation began about the future of health care in the United States. Civility reigned in a 90-minute Public Square forum yesterday at the Richmond Times-Dispatch. The forum featured two local congressmen on opposite sides of a political fight over health-care reform that grew nasty at town-hall meetings across the country last month.

A leading opponent of proposed health care reforms in Congress predicted at a Richmond Times-Dispatch Public Square today that differences could be bridged to produce acceptable legislation.

The Times-Dispatch will hold a Public Square on health care reform tomorrow at 10 a.m. in our downtown office at 300 East Franklin St. Two of the Richmond area’s congressmen—Republican Eric Cantor and Democrat Bobby Scott—will discuss their views and take questions from the audience. It is an opportunity to gain deeper knowledge about one of the most complicated issues facing the country.

For the past month and a half, legislators across the state and nation have been hosting their own health-care town halls. But the Richmond Times-Dispatch is bringing together two lawmakers on opposite sides of the debate for a civil conversation about health-care reform. Tomorrow, U.S. Reps. Eric I. Cantor, R-7th, and Robert C. Scott, D-3rd, will come together at The Times-Dispatch’s 26th Public Square to assess health care. Cantor and Scott will briefly outline their positions on health care and then open the floor to questions and comments.

For the past month and a half, legislators across the state and nation have been hosting their own health-care town halls. But the Richmond Times-Dispatch is bringing together two lawmakers on opposite sides of the debate for a civil conversation about health-care reform. On Monday, U.S. Reps. Eric I. Cantor, R-7th, and Robert C. Scott, D-3rd, will come together at The Times-Dispatch’s 26th Public Square to assess health care. Cantor and Scott will briefly outline their positions on health care and then open the floor to questions and comments.

U.S. Reps. Eric I. Cantor, R-7th, and Robert C. Scott, D-3rd, will assess health-care reform at the next Richmond Times-Dispatch Public Square. The event is scheduled for 10 a.m. Sept. 21 at the Times-Dispatch’s downtown offices, 300 E. Franklin St. Cantor and Scott will briefly outline their positions, then open the floor to questions and comments.

U.S. Reps. Eric I. Cantor, R-7th, and Robert C. Scott, D-3rd, have agreed to kick off the next Richmond Times-Dispatch Public Square, which will focus on the debate over health-care reform. They will briefly outline their positions, then open the floor to questions and comments. While legislators statewide have been hosting their own health-care town halls, this unique Times-Dispatch event will bring together two of Virginia’s most knowledgeable officials on the subject of health-care reform.

Suddenly, we’re town hall nation. Again. Down goes the news conference. Oh, so stuffy and staged. Up comes the theater-style—a much better way to get out the message and engage THE PEOPLE. Health care reform has turbocharged the town hall discussions and, in some ways, cheap ened the potential value of public discourse. The yelling, of course, has attracted the sound-bite attention. Health care is a natural for drama. Big money. Life and death. Lots of risk. The haves and have-nots. Clunky solutions. Good intentions. Questionable possibilities. Perfect for 60 to 90 minutes of questions and answers.

People without health insurance in Powhatan County look like anyone else. Most have full-time jobs, and many of the rest work part time. But the people who come to the Free Clinic of Powhatan often live with medical conditions that the insured do not—like the man who came for treatment of an abscess after falling off a ladder weeks earlier. His wife had splinted his broken arm at home with a board.

On Tuesday evening, The Times-Dispatch held its 25th Public Square at its downtown building. More than 70 people turned out to discuss whether government is doing too much or not enough. After the conversation, cake was served in celebration of the landmark Public Square. Tom Silvestri, publisher and president of The Times-Dispatch, served as moderator. Here’s an edited transcript of the comments. To watch the entire Square online, go to TimesDispatch.com, keyword: Public Square.

Midlothian resident Elizabeth Bale is deeply worried about how trillions of dollars in government spending, and the resulting public debt load, will affect her children’s quality of life. “Their future is going to be much bleaker than ours,“ Bale said last night at a Public Square hosted by the Richmond Times-Dispatch. “It is shameful that as grown-ups, we allow this to happen.