Lou Pope and Russanna Fountain both have 24-year-old children without insurance. They walked past each other at Gwinnett County’s courthouse late last week. But they are miles apart in their views of the newly passed health care law.

Pope, who works for the solicitor, supports the new law, which among many other provisions would allow young adults to stay on their parents’ insurance plan until they are 26. Her daughter is just out of college, “and there’s no way she can get coverage.”

“I just think more people should be covered,” said Pope, who also likes the ban on insurance companies refusing coverage to those with pre-existing conditions.

Fountain is insured but her 24-year-old son, Aaron, is not.

Still, she hates the bill. “I think it’s a big step toward socialized medicine,” she said. “It’s like someone gets a foot in the door, how do you get them out?”

Fountain, a Buford woman who works in the insurance industry, worries about the growing national debt, not being able to see the doctor of her choice, and the government making too many personal choices. “I have a big imagination of where things might be going,” she said.

Interviews with more than 20 metro Atlanta residents found sentiments ranging from anger to elation, worry to relief — and a healthy dose of wait-and-see.

More than a week ago, a CBS News poll found that 54 percent of Americans were confused about the bill. In interviews last week, it was apparent nearly everybody was informed to some extent about the legislation, although many said they are still unsure about what it means to them.

Before the vote, polls showed more Americans opposed the bill than supported it. After it passed, a USA Today/Gallup Poll had 49 percent supporting the bill and 40 percent opposed. Other polls showed the gap narrowing between opponents and supporters.

Jim Weaver, 81, a retired GM worker, said it is still sinking in. “I was leaning for it, but there was so much bickering that it’s hard to decipher what’s real,” said Weaver, collecting for the Shriners outside Matthews Cafeteria in Tucker.

He talked about the uninsured and closing the “doughnut hole” in Medicare drug payments but smiled, saying he really knows little about the 2,000-plus page bill. Nor does he think many congressmen do, either. “I don’t think most read the bill,” he said.

Inside the cafeteria, Jim Fleming, who has an $86,000 surgically rebuilt back, does not like the government mandating that people buy insurance. And he worries about the IRS being involved in administering health care. But the bill wasn’t what disgusted him most. It was the process Congress used to approve it.

In fact, he was so angry (he used a stronger word) that he fired off a throw-the-bums-out e-mail to several friends. And not just the Democrats, he said.

“I want to get rid of them, all of them,” Fleming said.

On Saturday, more than 500 people gathered at the Cobb Galleria Centre at the Defending the American Dream summit to loudly say something was wrong.

Speakers such as U.S. Rep. Tom Price of Georgia, one of the Republican point men on the issue, referred to Revolutionary patriot Sam Adams, saying citizens needed to “set brush fires for freedom.”

Wendy Crews, 62, of Woodstock, spoke to Price after his speech. She said people need to get more active but is unsure how many will. “It’s annoying how many people know who’s on ‘American Idol’ but not who’s in their government,” she said.

Bill Sanford, 67, also from Woodstock, wore his “colors,” a Fair Tax T-shirt with IRS crossed out. He thinks the activities of the past week may spur more public action.

“This was a new low in bribery and chicanery,” he said.

On the other hand, John Blaylock, a 53-year-old painting contractor from Grayson who was walking into the Gwinnett courthouse Thursday, thinks too many are being “brainwashed” by talk radio.

Blaylock was happy to see the bill passed. He had been unable to get his wife onto his insurance policy because of pre-existing conditions. “My biggest disappointment is people are so self-centered,” he said. “Come on, help your neighbor.”

Dr. Elliot Feit, co-owner of the Gwinnett County-based Children’s Medicine, is furious.

“I feel my career has been stolen from me after practicing 30 years,” he said. “The agenda of this administration is to bankrupt the insurance companies. There’s no doubt the agenda is to go to a single-payer system.”

On the other side of the divide was Dr. Bryan Smith, a neurology resident at Emory University.

“It’s kind of exciting to see this big of a change,” he said while walking into the hospital. “It’s a great idea to expand health coverage to as many people as possible. I think the medical community is flexible and can accommodate the changes.”

Smith pointed to a passing physician, Dr. Gregory Esper, director of neurology at Emory, and said he would have an opinion.

Esper said it’s a noble goal to expand coverage to more people, but the government would inevitably cut payments to physicians when treating Medicare patients.

“The consensus of many physicians is this will, in the years to come, greatly reduce small and solo practices,” he said. “We are dubious there are any savings. We’re dubious of the future of medicine as it exists now.”

Melissa Gilbert, a 35-year-old post-doctoral fellow who performs cancer research at Emory, said she’s “excited and extremely relieved someone’s finally doing something.”

She said the rhetoric will eventually calm down as the new law is implemented. “It’s like any new legislation,” she said. “People are scared at being told what to do.”

Chris Danzis, 31, the medical assistant in a solo practitioner’s office in Lawrenceville, doesn’t like being told what to do. Danzis is without insurance, as is her 12-year-old daughter. She said she has not applied to get the state-sponsored PeachCare for her daughter “because I refuse to get handouts.”

Danzis said she doesn’t see much support for “Obamacare” but, “I associate mostly with conservatives. I guess who you surround yourself with is your reality.”