"No Way to Treat a President" - GOP Performance at Obama Speech Was Un-American (Eugene Robinson)

[jefferson_dem]

No Way to Treat a President

By Eugene Robinson
Friday, September 11, 2009

Anyone who watched Wednesday night as President Obama explained his health-care reform proposals to Congress saw a chief executive making what sounded like a genuine appeal for bipartisanship -- and his opponents behaving like a bunch of spoiled first-graders. Obama should ignore them, even if they hold their breath until they turn blue.

House Republicans were particularly ostentatious in showing their disrespect not just for Obama but for the office he holds. The outburst by Rep. Joe Wilson of South Carolina -- who shouted "You lie!" when Obama said his plan would not cover illegal immigrants -- was only the most egregious display of contempt. Rep. Eric Cantor of Virginia, the House minority whip, fiddled with his BlackBerry while the commander in chief was speaking. Other Republicans made a show of waving copies of their own alleged reform plan, which isn't really a plan at all.

And Rep. Louie Gohmert of Texas waved hand-lettered signs at the president, as if he thought he were attending one of those made-for-television town-hall meetings rather than a solemn gathering of the nation's highest elected officials.

Throughout the speech, there was grumbling, mugging and eye-rolling on the Republican side that was not only undignified but frankly un-American. When I was a correspondent in London, I covered far more raucous sessions of the British House of Commons -- that's how Parliament treats the prime minister, who is the head of government. In the United States, that simply is not how Congress treats the president, who is the head of state.

Congress didn't heckle Lyndon Johnson like that during the Vietnam War or Richard Nixon during the Watergate scandal. Congress didn't even show that kind of bitterness and aggression toward George W. Bush, who did lie -- specifically, about the intelligence that his administration relied on to justify an unnecessary war that has cost 4,300 American lives and enough money to fund Obama's health-care proposals for a decade.


<SNIP>

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/10/AR2009091003406_pf.html

[fishnfla]

1. Neil Young's "southern man" keeps playing in my ear

screaming and bullwhips cracking

white man yelling at the black man, mad about the brown man

[wilt the stilt]

2. In my fantasy

Joe Wilson is dropped into the middle of Harlem

[HamdenRice]

3. If he were dropped in the middle of Harlem, he could have a fine meal, catch a show and walk around

and admire the beautiful architecture, just like the thousands of other white people who walk around and live in Harlem with their black neighbors. So I'm not sure what your comment is supposed to mean.

[wilt the stilt]

4. You are right

what I meant is have him dropped into the middle of some African Americans who may just take issue with his disrespect for the treatment he gave to Obama. Last night, I heard that in DC radio stations that the African American communities have taken notice at the obvious disrespect that these republicans are giving to our President and they know where it is coming from

[HamdenRice]

9. It's odd how there really aren't many dangerous neighborhoods in NYC any more

I'm black, and even I used to be afraid of East Harlem (not West Harlem), because there were whole blocks that were drug market places full of junkies. I also wouldn't go on foot to East New York (actually a part of Brooklyn), Brownsville (Brooklyn), Bushwick (Brooklyn), much of the South Bronx or Alphabet City (the part of Manhattan east of the East Village). I went to a party in Alphabet City in 1981 or so and was amazed at how many junkies I had to walk past to get to my friend's apartment. I also could not go to Howard Beach or Bensonhurst (not crime, but racist mobs).

Now it's amazing and no one really knows what actually happened, although there's plenty of Giuliani propaganda. Crime started falling under Dinkins when he took cops out of squad cars and made them walk the beat. I lived in Crown Heights, Brooklyn back then, and the effect was amazing, over night.

Now young white hipster kids are moving into Crown Heights, Bed Stuy and even Bushwick. Harlem if mostly gentrified. Black and Hispanic people hang out in Bensonhurst and Howard Beach. It was just like collective karma just changed.

[wilt the stilt]

14. I'm from Yonkers

and was baptized in Chinatown. My Mom was born in Chinatown and grew up in hell's kitchen when it was Hell's kitchen. There was a time like you said that you stayed clear of Harlem and Bed Sty.

[Ghost of Tom Joad]

5. Sudan

would be better

[CTyankee]

6. Oh, I like that...nt

[Renew Deal]

13. Have you ever been to Harlem?

[BeyondGeography]

7. The GOP is nothing more than the Confederate Party

The old slave states and their sympathizers. The struggle never ends.

[saltpoint]

8. Knowing that the address would be televised, GOP Congresscrittters,

some of them, anyway, appeared to make a point of being petulant and defiant.

"Yeah, Obama's up there talking about health care, but so uninvolved am I with his LIBERAL SOCIALIST AGENDA that I think I'll just fidget with my blackberry," or, in Joe Wilson's case, "Despite the president's consistently faithful representation of the matter at hand, I want to rabble-rouse the nutbag demographic, and so I'll yell out 'You Lie!' when he gets to the immigration component. That will signal to my far-Righ constituents that their tea-bagging, slanderous, hate speech at town halls all summer was justified, and gee, I hope nothing bad happens to the president if some yahoo goes too far."

[treestar]

10. I am so sick of these jerks

their behavior shows they are not fitted for the high offices they were elected to, and I can't have much favorable view of the people who voted them in, either.

[quantass]

11. Republicans can now use this Wilson sondbite for campaigning if...

it ends up healthcare reform is a disaster (i.e., trigger which then would lead to higher prices and mandates) and republicans can come out and say "see we told you the democrats would ruin your healthcare through spending" and show the clip of the "YOU LIE" as a way of showing repblicans trying to stand up to Obama before it passed. Ouch!

This all hinges on whether a trigger is included in the final bill....if it does then it might be goodnight for democrats in a few years. Lets hope for the best and a strong public option is in the works

[Baltoman991]

15. Wrong!!!

The lie was about illegal immigrants being covered. The trigger never entered into the equation.

And yeah, the Republicans might be dumb enough to try and use it as a rallying call but Americans have already voiced their displeasure with Wilson and know it was in fact, he who was lying.

So I doubt you'll get anyone behind Wilson besides the 28% who still exist.

[Spazito]

12. Mr. Robinson, as usual, nails it...

Great read, thanks for posting the link.

Recommended.

[Overseas]

16. Thanks again Eugene! K&R. //nt

[Cha]

17. Wow, a little bit of history on 9/11, Eugene Robinson,

thank you!

"Congress didn't heckle Lyndon Johnson like that during the Vietnam War or Richard Nixon during the Watergate scandal. Congress didn't even show that kind of bitterness and aggression toward George W. Bush, who did lie -- specifically, about the intelligence that his administration relied on to justify an unnecessary war that has cost 4,300 American lives and enough money to fund Obama's health-care proposals for a decade"

Oh, he's good!


"You will note that I have not yet mentioned race. For the record, I suspect that Obama's race leads some of his critics to feel they have permission to deny him the legitimacy, stature and common courtesy that are any president's due. I can't prove this, however. And if I'm right, what's anybody supposed to do about it? There's no way to compel people to search their souls for traces of conscious or unconscious racial bias. We could have an interesting discussion about the historical image of the black man in American society, but that wouldn't get us any closer to universal health care."