Yesterday morning I sent a $25 check to the opponent of Congressman Joe Wilson in South Carolina. Apparently 500K came roaring in to that guy in 24 hours.Sure enough, I started getting appeals from every congress person I ever gave money to. They were asking me to help them fight Joe Wilson by sending them money. I also got appeals for money from some of environmental groups seeking to get in on the feeding frenzy.
My feeling is, if we want to get Joe Wilson out of office then we should send his democratic opponent lots of money, and forget every one else that wants to make themselves victims of that asshole.
Here is what my sister Carlota said about the whole thing.
"I am just shaking with rage about Rep. Wilson. Apparently, he is taking a lot of grief. His website has crashed, as I tried to send the one-word message, "Shame."
What's really disturbing about the behavior of many (not all) of the Republicans is that they feel empowered to express such animosity and rudeness....as though it were now an acceptable thing to do. This is a foreboding of a terrible climate in our country's governance, and I fear it will get worse. I feel so sorry for my country."
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What's even worse, reportedly Max Baucus & Kent Conrad want to toughen the health care bill's anti-immigrant provisions to appease Joe Wilson and the Republicans who have no intention of supporting any health care reform. Yes, giving in to the hysteria will shut 'em up. Sigh.
According to: http://www.americablog.com/2009/09/baucus-conrad-cave-again-toughen-health.html
Enough to drive one mad.
Not in any way to defend his outburst; what other choice did he have?
He had a legitimate question; how can you promise that illegal aliens will not get free care, while at the same time making it against the law to check for proof of citizenship before treatment?
and he had no other place to ask it, where the answer would not have been no comment, or no answer at all. The question still is, as far as I know, unanswered.
To turn on a phrase; those who make asking questions civilly, impossible, make asking questions uncivilly, inevitable.
If you walk up to a politician or public servant, and ask them a legitimate question about your power, your resources, and their public service, they can, and often do, say "no comment".
Right now you cannot ask a question civilly in an APS Board Meeting, about executive and administrative role modeling of the student standards of conduct. Their response is "no comment".
If you ask them why the will not allow an independent audit of our power, our resources, and their public service, their response is "no comment".
What choice have they given to stakeholders,except to ask the questions less civilly?
I believe in the English form of government, these kinds of outbursts are common, and force good ol' boys to answer questions that they would really rather not.
Maquigg...I am not one to stand on every tradition as being sacred. Civility and maturity is something that has set the Senate and House apart in governing. Even bush at his worst would not have condoned this, although he never pubiclly scolded cheney for telling another Senator to go F**K himself. Things are hard enough in this country with out reverting civil war kinds of politics. If you read history you will know that Lincoln was subjected to this kind of thing constantly. I think he is remembered more than those who treated him so cheaply.
As I noted, I was not condoning, only bemoaning the fact that public servants are not available for legitimate questions.
President Obama did not go to that meeting with the intention of answering any questions. His only invitation to answer questions, was to offer to answer them off the record.
While not condoning the forum in which Joe Wilson expressed his opinion, I had numerous outbursts myself at some of the inaccuracies and lies being espoused by Obama. (I will at least give him the respect that you don't give to Bush by even capitalizing his name.)
You mention Republicans sitting on their hands. Please, that is no different than what happened when Bush gave a speech.
I feel sorry for my country and this state with all of you Libs running around thinking that you know what is best for all of us.
"I feel sorry for my country and this state with all of you Libs running around thinking that you know what is best for all of us."
Please... as if that doesn't happen on both sides of the aisle. The only difference is when the conservatives do it, they find some line from the Bible, manufacture its meaning, then rub it in the face of the populace. The conservatives seem to stand for nothing but division.
CM -
"President Obama did not go to that meeting with the intention of answering any questions."
Meeting? It wasn't a meeting. It was an address by the POTUS to a joint session of congress. There was not Q&A period. After reiterating what is quite easily found in several versions of the proposes legislation - that the House and Senate bills would bar illegal immigrants from getting subsidies to join the new insurance system - the congressman from SC called the POTUS a liar, plan and simple. It is fairly common practice for the oppositon party to voice displeasure about a policy statement or claim in a Presidential speech, but never has anyone been so crass, so disrespectful of the POTUS to call them a liar in such circumstances.
But, one must consider the source I suppose. A racist white man from a state that insists on flying a confederate battle flag on the grounds of the state capital. A southern white man who maintains membership in a white supremacist organization. A congressman who receives hundreds of thousands of dollars from health insurance and pharma corporations. I suspect he was just doing what he was paid to do.
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