Don’t Hate Him Because He’s Right

I can’t pretend that I know what it’s like to have to face the scrutiny of hundreds of your Congressional peers as they publicly denounce you for a comment as harmless as “You lie”, but I wish that South Carolina Representative Joe Wilson had not been so humble and contrite after his now famous outburst during Barack Obama’s speech on health care last night:

Vice President Joe Biden says a Republican congressman’s outburst during President Barack Obama’s health-care speech Wednesday night “demeaned the institution.”

South Carolina Rep. Joe Wilson shouted “You lie” after Obama said extending health care to all Americans would not mean insuring illegal immigrants.

Appearing on ABC’s “Good Morning America” Thursday, Biden said the incident made him “embarrassed for the chamber and a Congress I love.”

“There’ll be time enough to consider whether or not we ought to make it clear that that action is unacceptable in the House of Representatives,” House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., said late Wednesday on WTOP radio when asked about possible punishment for Wilson. “I’ve talked to Republican members who share that view.”

“Everybody was stunned,” Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., said of Wilson’s eruption. “It was just something that nobody had ever witnessed before. We all felt embarrassed.”

Embarrassing? Demeaning? Just leave it to the self-righteous liberals to feign moral indignance, AS IF they were ever actually concerned about congressional decorum. Do I need to bring up the last eight years under President George Bush?

Actually, I just googled “Democrats boo Bush”, and the phrase pops up as a top google search term; I’m glad the public hasn’t forgotten. For anyone who has, here’s a quick reminder:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RBxmEGG71PM

The left’s pseudo-indignance on all things inappropriate is bad enough. The double standard is even worse. THEY want to tell REPUBLICANS about demeaning behavior?

That hurts, but what pains me most is how a man whose only offense is being too emotional when challenging the president’s claims is so quickly abandoned by his own party. It’s as though Republicans think Democrats will start playing nice if they Republicans start picking on their own kind (I’m pretty sure we’ve tried this before. It doesn’t work).

Apparently, John McCain is as odious as ever:

Reaction to the outburst included criticism from members of Wilson’s own party.

“Anybody who would cat-call the president of the United States addressing this body is very, very inappropriate, and he will hear from a lot of us about that,” Rep. Jerry Lewis, R-Calif., told FOX News Radio.

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., said Wilson’s behavior was “totally disrespectful. There is no place for it in that setting, or any other, and he should apologize for it immediately.”

They can’t seem to denounce Rep. Wilson fast enough. I’m not sure what Republicans think they’re going to gain from it. Perhaps they’re confusing the Congressman for being a sex offender, or maybe a drug addict. Or, at least, a tax-evader? Actually, those would all be crimes that Democratic officials have been found guilty of over the past few years, so those offenses must be off limits.

Instead, let’s all raise hell because a Republican Congressman shouted, “You lie” during a Presidential address. Did anyone else notice that the rest of the audience was booing, too?

I’d hate to see the Democrats use this minor, minor event as a way to garner opposition against Republicans at a time when we’ve finally made some gains in fighting Obama’s socialist healthcare agenda. What our Party should be doing now is unifying to challenge the REAL threat at hand (and an FYI to the John McCain’s of the world, it’s not Joe Wilson. Sorry.).

The truth is that Rep. Wilson did not express anything different from what many others in that room were thinking that night, and what 52% of Americans right now believe. The Congressman would have every right to defend himself against these unwarranted attacks, and the rest of his Party would be wise not to bail on him now.

Cross-posted at Conservatives with Attitude!

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