On Aug. 13, I saw town hall community organizers in action. I am a conservative who values cooperating with liberals and others to advance good government, like reforming U.S. trade policy to save our economy.

That morning, I was attending seminars presented by labor union trade reform allies at Netroots Nation, the liberal blogger conference at the David Lawrence Center in Pittsburgh. These bloggers deserve much of the credit for President Barack Obama's election victory.

At noon, as I was leaving to return to Butler to travel with friends to U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter's 3 o'clock town hall meeting in Kittanning, hundreds of well-organized Obama health care advocates, fully equipped with printed posters, hats, pins and handouts, already were loading buses to Kittanning.

None of us wants people to go without adequate health care. However, these well-meaning friends are making a couple of big mistakes. First, socialized health care will make the problem worse, not better. Second, they claim health care is a human right. It's not. It's a human need. There's a huge difference.

Like food, health care must be earned through value-added work. What I mean is, if no one labors profitably to bring forth the produce of the earth, many people don't eat. Similarly, nations like ours that produce and sell less than they consume eventually go broke; then fewer and fewer people can afford health care and other needs. We see this throughout history in many nations.

America has been bankrupted by corporate globalist trade policy and socialist domestic social policy. Genuine free enterprise has been greatly weakened, undermining our ability to generate and distribute real economic opportunity and the wealth it creates.

Now our economy only generates phony wealth on paper and taxpayer-funded jobs.

So now we are dependent on foreign borrowing to pay for the things we want and need. That dog won't hunt for long.

When foreign nations decide to stop funding our standard of living, many more of us will be forced to do without health care, housing and other needs because there won't be enough jobs or handouts to go around.

When my friends and I arrived in Kittanning, the state troopers standing at the door informed us the meeting room was full. More than a thousand people filled the parking lot outside.

Some are now reporting that when those who got in line early enough were allowed to enter, many of those who arrived later by bus already filled half of the seats. If this is true, Specter should tell us who made the decision to reserve space for them ahead of those who waited in line.

As I later observed on TV, the front of the meeting room was full of Obama health care supporters who had a large share of the numbers the senator passed out to limit questions. They lobbed softball questions designed to allow Specter to mention positive pieces of the Obama health care program.

The critics got their opportunities too. Some did very well.

Outside, the pro- and anti-groups carried on the debate — the conservatives less organized than the liberals, but all very engaged.

Inside or outside, the majority of folks who oppose the Obama plan to socialize health care are ordinary citizens seeking the opportunity and the words to express their deep conviction that our national leaders, on both the right and left, are betraying everything we hold dear as Americans, including our opportunity to work to generate real wealth to meet our needs and help our neighbors.

It's not easy for everyday folks to articulate what we know to be the problem with our national leaders, especially in response to well-organized voices on the left and right. Nevertheless, the outrage, disappointment and common sense of these everyday unorganized citizens are getting through.

Let's hope they don't stop until there emerges a new generation of political leaders that remembers what made America free, strong and prosperous.

Dave Frengel of Butler is director of government affairs for Penn United Technology, Inc., in Cabot.