Tonight… I attended part of Congressman Bob Goodlatte’s much advertised (at last during our newscasts) town hall meeting on health care.

The auditorium at Hidden Valley High School was standing room only… and I’m not exaggerating. There must have been 600 or so people there… on a beautiful Thursday night. That is impressive.

I’ve been covering politics for almost 15 years, and I have never seen emotions this high. Sure, voters were irate a couple of years ago when the General Assembly passed a law increasing tickets for Virginia drivers but not out of state drivers. Of course, there was passion in the protests against the Iraq War. And yes, Democratic voters were energized for Barack Obama last November.

But none of that compares to what we’ve seen over the past six weeks at town hall meeting after town hall meeting. Many of them have erupted into shouting matches between angry constituents and members of Congress desperately trying to control the crowd.

Tonight’s meeting wasn’t unruly. To the contrary, the bulk of it was civil and very pro-Bob Goodlatte. But, that doesn’t mean the group lacked intensity. Roughly 90% of the crowd (my guess) was opposed to the current reforms being debated in Congress and the majority of them were eager to stand up and let it be known. Many made their point with personal tales of health care problems and issues they’ve had with Medicare or the VA System.

And, many of these people were smart. They had done their homework and came armed with real statistics and facts. They had obviously studied a lot of the proposals and weren’t relying on the misinformation that has been spread about health care reform.

In short, it was a very interesting night. If the other members of Congress were on the receiving end of this kind of town hall meeting, I’ll bet health care reform in its current state won’t make it out of either house of Congress.