U.S. Rep Brian Baird closed out a tumultuous congressional recess Wednesday with a town hall meeting before a capacity crowd at the Corbet Theatre in Centralia.

Both the Centralia College theater and a spillover room were completely full about 15 minutes before the start of the two-hour question-and-answer session during which about 20 speakers quizzed the Vancouver Democrat on issues ranging from cap and trade to economic stimulus measures.

The most frequented topic, however, was the ongoing debate over sweeping health care reform proposed by the Barack Obama Administration and being championed by the Democrat-led Congress.

Baird, a clinical psychologist, repeated what he has said throughout four previous town halls and several telephone conferences over the past weeks.

“My mind is absolutely not made up,” Baird told the crowd of more than 500.

While there are currently several versions of reform working through both houses of Congress, each of them deal directly with covering uninsured Americans through the creation of a public health care option that would be subsidized by the government.

Speakers were selected through a lottery-style process in which potential questioners were given a number which was placed in a barrel tumbler. Moderator Chris Bailey picked speakers randomly.

Centralia real estate agent J.R. McGee led off the questioning by telling Baird “We’re heading in a very strange direction. … We’re going to what people are running from.”

“Now it looks like our country is leaning toward ’give me, give me, give me,”’ McGee said.

Baird said that there is a personal responsibility aspect to the health care reform in that uninsured Americans would no longer be allowed to rely on those with coverage for their medical needs.

The crowd, which appeared divided between supporters and opponents of the legislation, became boisterous at times, beginning when Baird indicated that he didn’t agree with everything in the bills.

“I have probably never voted for a single bill of any consequence that I agreed with everything,” Baird said.

For the most part, the conversation remained calm and civil as Baird paced back and forth, answering questions from speakers at two different microphones on each side of the Corbet Theatre.

One of the more contentious exchanges of the evening came when Centralia City Council candidate Matthew Trent approached the microphone.

Trent read quotes from a number of founding fathers, among them Declaration of Independence author and third president Thomas Jefferson.

Trent, who is opposing Mayor Tim Browning in the November general election, said that he had no doubt Jefferson would consider Baird “an enemy of God and the Republic” for his record on spending and supporting government controls.

Baird responded strongly, refuting the notion that Jefferson would frown upon his record.

“It’s not just my ilk, my friend,” Baird said, noting that there was no budget deficit when former President Bill Clinton left office.

To reign in the ballooning federal deficit, Baird said “everything, everything should be on the table” for potential savings.

Later, when asked by another questioner about his support for the so-called stimulus measures, he noted that he has been an opponent of wasteful spending, most recently voting against the Cash for Clunkers program.

“The answer was I would have to beg the Chinese for (the money) and it’s not going to build anything,” he said, adding that he pushed to include money for road construction and infrastructure in the bill.

Gordon Johns, who practices as an ophthalmologist at Pacific Cataract and Laser Institute in Chehalis, was among several speakers to ask about tort reform and medical malpractice laws.

“We have to differentiate between a bad outcome and negligence,” he said.

Johns received a standing ovation after voicing his frustration that many hard-working Americans end up paying the costs for others, from people in poverty to crooked Wall Street executives.

“We’re responsible, we raise our kids, we pay our taxes, we vote, we go to church, we contribute to charity, but then we do all of these things, and when other people who don’t live the same lifestyle don’t follow those same principals, we are asked to bail them out,” he said, prompting wild applause from much of the crowd.

Throughout the night, Baird stressed that the proposed public option would be given no greater subsidies than private plans and that “nobody, period, would be forced to choose the public option.”

He also said that while illegal immigrants would have access to community clinics to prevent the spread of contagious diseases, none would be given health care insurance subsidies by the government.

As for whether or not he and other members of Congress would accept the same health care plan for themselves being offered to constituents, he said “absolutely.”

On several occasions, Baird revisited his comments from early August when his office initially planned to hold only telephone town halls due to what he called a “close to brown shirt tactics” and a “lynch mob mentality” evident at similar meetings across the country.

“I overreacted,” Baird said. “I’m sorry for it. I should never have said that.”

Baird answered to several speakers angry over the recently passed climate change bill that includes cap-and-trade measures. Baird said he voted for the bill, but only after a measure was included that allowed forest waste to be used as a renewable energy. He said that measure alone could result in thousands of jobs in the Northwest.

By no means did he agree with everything in the bill, he said, adding that when the votes are already locked in for a bill he has to weigh the benefits of going against it.

“If I go to the speaker of the House and say, ’There is no way I would ever vote for this bill. This is what I want,’ it’s not going to work,” he said.

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