As nearly everyone in the political universe has noted by now, President Barack Obama got disrespected Wednesday night…
So why get hot and bothered by the jackassery of a single Congressman from the Party of No? I think it has to do with the truckloads of lies and despicable slurs dropped on Obama in the past few months, many of them overtly racist. Our fury at Rep. Addison "Joe" Wilson’s blurted "You lie!" is not just a response to him, but to the never-ending feces-throwing by the GOP and a right-wing media engaged in a full-court smear fest of our first African American President…
But whether it’s racist tropes or moronic red-baiting, the right-wing media and way too many supposedly honorable Republicans have done nothing to tone down this rancid display. Plus the fact that if a Democratic Representative had yelled "You lie!" during a Bush speech, she’d still be doing time in a secret prison..h.
Happily, Wilson has already gotten what we can hope is the first round of a well-deserved comeuppance. He got dagger stares from Nancy Pelosi and Joe Biden and a lot of boos from that part of the media not (yet) beholden to Rupert Murdoch. Best of all a bunch of money has been raised for his opponent in the next election. That two-word outburst could be the most expensive Wilson ever makes in his life. Welcome to the viral smackdown, Congressman.
But, as diarist Frank wisely says, let’s not let this screamer steal the headlines for the next few days. Because that was not what Wednesday night was about; it’s not what all the wrangling has been about for the past several months. As President Obama pointed out, doing something about our broken health care system is not an issue that just appeared on the scene. Efforts have been made for decades. But because of past obstructionism, uncounted numbers of American have died, gone bankrupt, lived misery-filled lives, all because they were denied medical treatment based solely on their inability to pay for it…
I hope that this Joe Wilson business makes the Republicans rethink their strategy, but as this post points out, things like Wilson’s outburst, or the Fox News harangues, or this offensive email I received [above] aren’t the point. The point is a too long avoided Health Care Crisis in America. I spent 40 years as a physician, and a lot of it was spent trying to find ways to get people the care they needed against a gradient of profiteering. The waste and profit hunger in Medical Care is huge. It was part of my motive for retiring early. Now I volunteer for free, and it’s rewarding just like it was in those salad days of medical school.
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