So, Were These Instances Of “Political Terrorism?”
The left has a very short and convenient memory – it apparently begins at January 20th, 2009 and has no memory of , say, 2005. And the left now thinks that what his happening with these townhall meetings is simply unprecedented and a new, low chapter in right-wing extremism.
But as Jon Henke reminds us, this is nothing new:
* NW Progressive Institute, March 2005: “a boisterous crowd which frequently interrupted the discussion with shouts and hard nosed questions. … Democrats in the audience who were interrupting the panel…. the crowd erupted in anger… Democrats in the audience started shouting him down again.”
* Savannah Morning News, March 2005: “By now, Jack Kingston is used to shouted questions, interruptions and boos. Republican congressmen expect such responses these days when they meet with constituents about President Bush’s proposal to overhaul Social Security.”
* USA Today, March 2005: “Shaken by raucous protests at open “town hall”-style meetings last month … Santorum was among dozens of members of Congress who ran gantlets of demonstrators and shouted over hecklers at Social Security events last month. Many who showed up to protest were alerted by e-mails and bused in by anti-Bush organizations such as MoveOn.org and USAction, a liberal advocacy group. They came with prepared questions and instructions on how to confront lawmakers.”
You must understand that when Democrats did it in 2005, it was political dissent. Now that the right is engaged in the same sort of behavior, it is “political terrorism”.
They really don’t like it when their own tactics are used against them, do they?
~McQ
Kinda like how using your parent’s or boss’s own words against them never ends well, huh?
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The Left’s song and dance on this is at least a century old.
They incite riots, storm stages, shout down speakers and then claim the high ground for themselves. When any non-Left protests are raised against Leftist causes, they’re “brown shirts.”
It’s not getting old. It is old. Very old.
Too Fuc*in old…
It might be worth noting that when advocates of democratic policies were “boisterous” at town hall meetings it was in protest of things such as an unjust war and privitazation of entitlement programs. For there to be such an outcry over marginal changes to our health care system shows that conservative advocates are, indeed, puppets being manipulated by boisterous talkshow hosts and news pundits. The very example of the meeting where nearly all of the participants rejected any form of government run health care but who also admitted to being on medicare/medicaid just frightens me. Republicans have always been the party that calls for an informed populace. It seems to be that they need to hit the textbooks and not the radio dial.
“Marginal changes”. Damn – now that’s funny.
“Marginal changes”???? Hahahahahahaha!!!!
And a quick question for you there Silence… do people have a choice to be on Medicare once they reach a certain age? I mean, they’ve paid into it their whole lives – so should they just ‘opt out’ of something they weren’t allowed to ‘opt out’ of paying for?
Hypocrisy, thy name be the Democrats.
This is why liberals are as worthless as a pile of horsecrap on your lawn in the middle of summer. Sure it stinks, but do you really want to go near it to get rid of it?
You should go read Bill Maher’s latest column on HuffPo. In it, he says that Congressman shouldn’t go talk to their constituents because their constituents don’t know anything.
Typical elitist thinking from the American left.
Oh, and please tell us under what authority there are entitlement programs that should never, ever be privatized.
What we need is a good sized CME sent earthward to fry every electronic component on the planet. This would seperate the men from the boys on the enviromentalist side, show the poor in this country what it’s really like to live in poverty, and effectively silence people like bill maher.
No i don’t really wish this would happen but you have to admit it would be an effective way of demonstrating how hypocritical most enviromentalist are, show the poor how good they really had it, and show the elitist how dumn they really are.
Oh CME is Corronal Mass Ejection that comes from the sun. Think elelctromagnetic pulse.
Silence, if you think these are “marginal” changes then you need to read the bill and put down the tv remote. Regardless of what Obama says, the actual text of the bill does not say what you think it does. The call for an informed populace continues…
If the POTUS can shoot his mouth off about the bill without having read it, why can’t anyone else on the Left?
Besides, reading bills is above and/or below Barry’s pay grade, and he has a very important national park to take his family to, so leave him alone!
So, let me see if I have this straight: they threw tantrums because they might not be allowed to dig into someone else’s wallet?f that’s the case, imagine what the wallet owners should be justified in doing.
Unjust by what standard? The enemies?
You might want to look at the roots and funding of many of those protesters. They were virtually the same that protested every US action, but fell (not so)strangely silent during communist and other fascist aggression.
And it can be argued that the reason the advocates of non-statist policies are “boisterous” at town hall meetings right now is to protest the unconstitutional hijacking of health care in this country.
Pearlstein’s “Political Terrorism” line was over the top (referring to the current crop of bad actors, or Henke’s examples of the same kinda behavior, then), but thuggish and rude? Absolutely.
Anytime any person or group interrupts a person speaking at a town hall meeting by yelling or chanting slogans–whether the person is the elected official, or a fellow district resident–it’s rude behavior. Anytime anyone bangs on the doors and windows because they didn’t get a seat in the room, it’s thuggish behavior. Anytime anyone strikes another person–yeah, even if you’re on “my” side, and hit someone I probably wouldn’t agree with, politically–that’s thuggish behavior.
I’ll give a pass to folks on either side who don’t condemn their own. There’s no rule against keeping your mouth shut, and in my opinion (& speaking from experience), it’s a jump to state that just because a (lib/con) doesn’t come out and say that his/her fellow (lib/con) behaved poorly, that that means he’s not thinkin’ it.
But that “lookit then, lookit now” line of thinkin’ goes both ways. Anyone who applauded those thuggish and rude actions then and condemns them now — or condemned those patriotic acts then, but applauds them now — is a damned hypocrite. (Same goes for “nazi” references & other partisan “bad” behaviors.) Left or right, situational ethics and moral relativism will get you nowhere. Protest is still patriotic, but by the same token, rude is still rude.