This is a guest blog post, written by Kaitlyn Cunningham, a member of the Campus Progress Network.

Heated town hall meetings on health insurance reform have become a staple of this year’s Congressional recess. Last Tuesday, I had an opportunity to attend Barack Obama’s town hall meeting in New Hampshire. Based on my exposure to media sources prior to the event, I was pleasantly surprised at the meeting to see that the tea-baggers were out-numbered.

In Maine,  Senators’ Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe are refusing to hold town hall meetings on the health insurance bill, H.R. 3200. With that said, several young people from Maine and I made the trek to New Hampshire last week because we wanted an opportunity to shape the conversation.  Our group consisted of community organizers, students and a mother. We represented a group of people who recognize that the health care system must change in this country. In Maine almost 25% of people are without insurance. An even deeper statistic which was given to me by a local state senator is that of those people, 40% are between the ages of 20 and 29.
Tickets to the meeting were given out at random from the White House. Since many people wanted tickets we did not expect our group to get them. Fortunately some did, and those who didn’t were happy to be among the crowds of supporters outside the event.

Many in the media clearly believed that what was happening outside would be more newsworthy than the town hall itself. As is typical anytime a president travels protesters will arrive. I grew up in the Kennebunkport  experiencing, and sometimes being involved with, protests every summer when George W. Bush and his father would come to vacation here. We also knew that the meetings had been growing more and more violent and did not know what to expect. For this reason we woke up as early as we could and got to the rally first thing. We were determined to be a voice for change.

Almost 1,000 people had a similar idea, while only a quarter of those people were conservatives opposed to real reforms. Immediately those 250 people or so could be picked out of the crowd for being tea-baggers and conservatives who believed that playing patriotic music would really put those of us in favor of a public option in our place. (Seriously, I don’t think I’ve ever heard the Star Spangled Banner as much as I did that day.) They held signs showing President Obama looking like Hitler, or Heath Ledger’s Joker, and shouted the lies and misinformation they had heard from the likes of Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck. The most frustrating part was that they weren’t interested at all in having a discussion, they were wrapped up in their lies and didn’t want to be convinced otherwise.

I believe that had the press been genuine it would have focused more on the town hall meeting itself. At the meeting real policy was discussed. Barack Obama made certain that he spent more time addressing the fears people had and working with constituents to find solutions.

Everyone knows that the health care system is broken. However, the President is taking the time to actually talk with people about their concerns and I believe it is especially noble in this time of chaotic town hall meetings. Amid all of the expectations for violence and fear, last week’s meeting was actually productive. I want to see change happen.

I’d like to get for myself and many of my friends who are struggling to pay for medical treatment for themselves and their families to have the access to the quality health care that I know our country can provide.  I believe that it can happen and that young people should be speaking up about their experiences and opinions more. I do not believe that the press will ever get this story right. They will constantly be searching for the next infotainment story, featuring crazy conservatives who carry guns to town hall meetings, to place on their the front page, while those of us who have experienced the fear of being without insurance, or the grief of having bad insurance, can take consolation in knowing that the fear of being without health insurance is a lot greater than the fear of “becoming communist.”  As such, we will continue to hear lies, rumors, and misinformation from people in our lives about proposed reforms and it will be incumbent upon us to combat those lies with truths.

A great resource in our fight against the lies and misinformation is http://www.whitehouse.gov/realitycheck/ which is what I forward to all of my friends with questions.

Campus Progress Network members, along with other young progressives, are taking action across the country by attending town hall meetings, calling, and writing their legislators – Join them and Take Action Now