The Journal Gazette, 600 W. Main St., Fort Wayne IN

Standing in front of a microphone in a crowded auditorium, a frustrated cabinet maker chided Rep. Mark Souder, R-3rd, saying politicians fight like third-graders and give massive bailouts to big companies like AIG.

Wearing a suit jacket, dress shirt, no tie and a stoic expression, Souder listened to the man, who finished to applause before the next speaker had a turn at the microphone.

A near-capacity crowd filled the Auer Auditorium at Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne on Friday for Souder’s health care town hall listening session.

While some comments focused on health care, other comments strayed to topics as varied as a national sales tax and the conflict in Myanmar.

Before Souder came onstage, audience members were cautioned that police officers who stood sentinel throughout the auditorium would remove anyone who became unruly.

After entering to a standing ovation, Souder asked people to keep their comments to a “reasonable time limit” before inviting audience members to form lines at four microphones placed throughout the auditorium.

An immediate rumble followed Souder’s invitation as lines of about 10 people each quickly formed at each microphone. Those lines remained about the same length for hours, replenished by more audience members.

Through most of the session, Souder listened to several questions before making comments. When he did comment, he referred to past efforts by Republicans to change health care to reflect free-market principles, including the tort system, that were blocked by Democrats and some liberal Republicans.

Souder also said innovation in medical care, such as hip implants, come only from the private sector, not from government programs like Medicare or Medicaid.

“So we’d better not kill the system that has created these innovations,” Souder said.

Speakers opposed to national health care expressed concerns that a government system would strip freedoms, lead to health care rationing, euthanasia and socialism.

One speaker suggested “higher powers” might be behind the health care overhaul movement, mentioning the Illuminati and New World Order familiar to conspiracy theorists.

A breast cancer survivor and a mother of two autistic children were among those speakers who support change, saying that families face bankruptcy by paying high out-of-pocket medical bills.

One speaker whose family was bankrupted by an injury her mother suffered spoke against national health care.

Ann Englehart, 38, said although her family had to move into subsidized housing when she was a child after her mother was injured in an accident, she doesn’t trust the government to effectively manage health care.

“I just feel like people are putting too much faith in the federal government,” Englehart said.

Englehart said she does support smaller stop-gap measures to protect families facing unmanageable health care costs.

“I mean, it breaks my heart, because I’ve been there,” Englehart said.

Before the town hall meeting began, a group of about 18 people holding signs stood outside the music hall in a grassy area cordoned off with rope because signs were not allowed inside the auditorium.

One of the sign holders, Edith Kenna, representing Hoosiers for a Commonsense Health Care Plan, said the organization supports a single-payer system that removes the profit incentive from health care.

“We are also for a civil discussion about various bills that are out there in Washington,” Kenna said.

Touching on issues later raised by speakers inside the auditorium, Kenna said health care must be portable, affordable and accessible.

“As long as there’s a profit motive, you can’t control costs,” Kenna said.

Kenna said those opposed to her group’s version of health care reform have used “scare tactics” to frighten people, suggesting that reform would introduce practices like euthanasia and that it would usher in socialism.

“People are afraid, and that’s not good,” Kenna said.

bmanley@jg.net