Live at the Gingrey Town Hall

Congressman Phil Gingrey is holding a town-hall meeting in Cartersville at the Clarence Brown Conference Center the morning after he held a similar session in Dallas.  Gingrey's focus during this visit home from Washington is the House Republican "Path to Prosperity" budget. We're covering it live on Twitter (@CvillePatch) and compiling the tweets here for comments and further reading.

11:39 a.m. And that's the end of the meeting. Thanks for following along. We'll have video later.

11:38 a.m. Gingrey: "We want to take care of the elderly. We are the elderly."

11:37 a.m. Gingrey: Part of the idea for Medicare is to allow health care providers to "balance bill" and charge people who can afford beyond the Medicare reimbursement amount. But the provider has to take someone who can't afford a higher amount for each balance-billed patient.

11:35 a.m. Gingrey: As for providers being there, the Republican majority believes that putting more control in the hands of the governors will help.

11:34 a.m. Gingrey: I agree with you. These people will be taken care of.

11:33 a.m. Gingrey: Premium support under the Republican plan for Medicare would rise as people aged, and the poorest people would receive more support.

11:31 a.m. Gingrey: It has to be people helping people and neighborhood institutions and the faith-based community stepping up.

11:30 a.m. Last question: Doctors in Cartersville have refused to accept any more Medicaid patients. How are they going to get care? Should we not be able to take care of our disabled people better?

11:28 a.m. Gingrey: "I don't call it privatizing. I call it an individual, personal account." He says the idea parallels the Medicare proposal.

11:25 a.m. Gingrey: Federal employees have the opportunity to invest in a thrift savings plan and get a federal match. That's similar to what was proposed for Social Security under President George W. Bush.

11:23 a.m. Gingrey: "I would prefer it," but those terms like privatization scare people.

11:23 a.m. New question: Any thought about privatization of Social Security?

11:22 a.m. Gingrey points to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton as pushing the action in Libya, not the secretary of defense. "I think it was a huge mistake."

11:21 a.m. Gingrey: "Bottom line, it's a mell of a hess in the Middle East. ... I don't think we should have gone into Libya at all."

11:19 a.m. Gingrey: He says he always thought Iraq should pay us back for liberating the nation from Saddam Hussein, but that's not the deal.

11:15 a.m. An Iranian-American woman asks about foreign policy. She says Iran is taking advantage of U.S. actions in Iraq and Afghanistan. She asks what Gingrey's opinion is about the wars.

11:14 a.m. Gingrey: I just have to accept the positions of the experts. "I think it's time to move on, quite honestly."

11:13 a.m. Gingrey says he has no idea what the best route would be. He's not an engineer. He says he had nothing to do with the route and shouldn't.

11:12 a.m. Gingrey says when he was first elected to Congress in 2002, he heard two big issues up here: Don't let people take our water, and help use get the 411 Connector.

11:11 a.m. Gingrey: As you say, most people in Rome don't care much about the exact route. It's been worked on for a long, long time.

11:10 a.m. Linda Smith from the Coalition for the Right Road asks about supporting a compromise route for the 411 Connector.

11:08 a.m. Gingrey: We'll look into those two congressional bills. You should be able to work with state legislators on S.B. 18.

11:05 a.m. Next is Cpl. Byron Hoage, 2nd Medical Company, Georgia State Defense Force. He says because state Senate Bill 18 has not been passed, volunteer military forces aren't covered if they deploy to help people. They can be fired. He also calls for help in Congress with H.R. 1451 and H.R. 1383.

11:03 a.m. Gingrey: I'm not a monetary expert, but as the value of the dollar falls, it's ruining the value of people's assets. It's a concern the first two speakers addressed.

11:02 a.m. Third questioner: Where do you stand on a stronger or weaker dollar?

11 a.m. Second questioner: We need some course of action to monitor and control the Federal Reserve.

10:58 a.m. Gingrey: We have probably until July 8 to address this. And then it would be five or six months before a real crisis hit.

10:58 a.m. Gingrey: Pretty soon you get down to the Department of Education. Maybe their check comes in a little slower.

10:57 a.m. Gingrey: Maybe we'll have to sell some land. But we'll meet our debt obligations first, then entitlements and military.

10:56 a.m. Gingrey: A fixed debt ceiling doesn't mean money stops coming in and bills stop getting paid. We just have to prioritize, just like you.

10:55 a.m. Gingrey: Unless my constituents persuade me not to vote for a higher debt ceiling under any circumstances.

10:54 a.m. Gingrey: A $3 trillion increase in the debt ceiling over a year to me is out of the question, but $500 billion over six months might work.

10:54 a.m. He mentions a balanced-budget amendment, among other measures to cut spending.

10:54 a.m. Gingrey: I believe that raising the debt ceiling is a very dangerous road to go down if we don't have some serious reforms in place.

10:52 a.m. Gingrey questions the doom-and-gloom scenarios about not raising the debt limit. He doesn't believe what the administration says.

10:50 a.m. Gingrey: I agree with the applause, and I think the comments are very good, very prescient, and maybe beyond my understanding.

10:49 a.m. First question: We need to prepare for failure because you control only one-half of one-third of the government. We need to say in congressional hearings what defines failure, such as the plunging value of the dollar. We need hearings to address what we will do to be prepared.

10:47 a.m. After a few more comments about the debt, Gingrey opens the floor to questions.

10:45 a.m. Gingrey: The Obama budget would spend 23 percent to 25 percent of GDP annually the next 10 years; the GOP budget would knock it down to 20 percent.

10:43 a.m. Gingrey: If we do nothing to Medicare, it will go bankrupt in 2020. (Meanwhile, a woman in the back has a sign that on ones side calls for leaving Medicare alone and on the other side calls for taxing millionaires and billionaires.)

10:42 a.m. Gingrey: We have to look at changes to the entitlement programs to balance the budget, but anyone 55 and over won't see changes to Medicare.

10:41 a.m. Gingrey: Defense makes up about half of the discretionary 40 percent of the budget, and nobody wants to touch defense.

10:40 a.m. Gingrey: Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, debt interest and such legal obligations make up about 60 percent of the budget.

10:39 a.m. Gingrey: The president has changes his budget ideas since the GOP budget passed, and "I'm willing to give him a mulligan."

10:38 a.m. Gingrey: The House GOP budget is now sitting on Sen. Harry Reid's desk, awaiting Senate action.

10:37 a.m. Gingrey: This is the Republican budget we passed two weeks ago. It differs significantly from President Obama's February proposal.

10:33 a.m. Gingrey is going to move quickly through the six-slide presentation on the Path to Prosperity, the same one he used in Dallas. You can find the details at the live blog from Thursday's meeting.

10:32 a.m. Gingrey: Sometimes what happens is too big for the state to happen. The government is there to help with the things we can't do ourselves, but otherwise, the government should leave us alone.

10:30 a.m. Gingrey: This meeting was going to be about have overburdened we are by the federal government, but this shows there is a role for the federal government.

10:29 a.m. Gingrey: I'm going to be leaving here and joining Commissioner Clarence Brown and Sheriff Clark Millsap in touring the damage.

10:28 a.m. Gingrey: Then something like this happens. Three counties in our district have been declared disaster areas but no deaths yet.

10:27 a.m. Gingrey: This was supposed to be a routine town-hall meeting focusing on the budget and spending and the debt ceiling.

10:25 a.m. Loudermilk: Gingrey believes that government should get out of the way and let neighbors help neighbors.

10:24 a.m. Loudermilk: Neighbors are helping neighbors. No one has requested shelter because people are stepping up to help.

10:23 a.m. Sen. Loudermilk: Locals are doing a phenomenal job of organizing searches, helping with the disaster recovery.

10:21 a.m. Congressman Gingrey has arrived. Sen. Barry Loudermilk is introducing him before heading out to assist storm victims.

10:16 a.m. Among the attendees are state Reps. Christian Coomer and Paul Battles, state Sen. Barry Loudermilk, County Manager Stephen Bradley, and Cartersville-Bartow Chamber of Commerce President Joe Frank Harris. But no congressman yet.

10:13 a.m. Battles: "We pray also for our military."

10:10 a.m. We're doing the invocation with state Rep. Paul Battles before the congressman arrives. Not surprisingly, he's focusing on the storm victims, especially those who have lost everything. He notes that the death toll continues to rise.

10:01 a.m. The Gingrey town hall should start any minute. We're just waiting for the congressman. About 35 people are here.

While we're waiting, here's the full text of the statement Gingrey's office issued Thursday in response to the storms that tore through his 11th District on Wednesday:

As severe storms struck across the Southeastern U.S., many areas of Northwest Georgia were among those affected, including Bartow, Floyd, and Polk Counties. These storms and tornadoes are some of the worst natural disasters our country has seen in recent years, resulting in the tragic loss of human life. My thoughts and prayers go out to the victims and families, and I offer my support to the countless families, homes, and businesses that were devastated by these catastrophes. I would also like to thank those emergency first responders who are still working tirelessly to overcome this crisis, save lives, and meet the challenges many are facing during this time of inexplicable tragedy.