Tuesday, September 01, 2009
Update to "Captain Renault is alive and well"
A couple news stories relating to the above mentioned post : first, Code Pink founder Medea Benjamin says of the town hall protestors, "I think they've been effective in making this a real national debate, and that's healthy," said Benjamin. "It has opened up the debate." in this interview . Second, this video of ObamaCare Organizer Explains How to Shout Down Opponents.
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I live in Speaker Hastert's District and we became accustomed to many protestors. Some where members of my Church out in front of his office. Code Pink and others would come to events where Hastert was speaking. Some of them were pretty agressive. (I had one in an outlandish costume on my back ranting about Congressman Foley and Hastert shielding pedofiles as I left an event with my kid in tow.) I can't recall Hastert every calling them names, or questioning their right to do what they were doing.
Lashing out at Americans this why a sign of real weakness and lack of confidence in ones own ideas and positions.
PS.. I mean Progressives who have lashed out at fellow Americans as "teabaggers" and so on...
I fully expect the wheels to come off Obama's bus. Those failures are going to demand reevaluation of much of Liberalism and lashing out at Americans is exactly the wrong way to rebuild the shambles Liberalism has become.
Bill,
Did Hastert ever have a "town hall" style meeting a particular issue where constituent could ask questions? Did he ever have one of these Code Pinkers or other protesters come into the town hall and use the opportunity of asking a question to inform Hastert that "you should be afraid of Bush, we're all afraid of Bush"?
I don't recall a townhall but you could walk into his office and ask him.
My Church's Social Justice Committee met with his staff on Darfur. We were certainly not a basket of GOP voters and his office knew that.
Hastert was a typical old Illinois Republican and got along with local Democrats as well as Republicans. He was a pretty affable guy.
Code Pink was a permant presence outside his office for a few years and I can't recall any problems, or Hastert saying anything negative about them.
Batavia made a point of accomadating and there were some Stories about it in the local press. The permanent protest had to be a pain for the restaurants and stuff nearby.
His son is running to fill his old seat and has already held town halls on health care. Bill Foster (Dem who replaced Hastert) hasn't held any Town Halls and hasn't responded to any of my emails either. Hastert's staff always responded, even when I was a Clinton Democrat complaining about impeachment. I always got a letter back.
The only things I can find about Code Pink and Hastert are:
(1) the 2006 post-Mark Foley protest outside his Batavia office. Even a right-wing blog commenting on the protest doesn't claim that they were somehow preventing Hastert's constituents from being able to speak with him, or impeding his speaking.
(2) When Iraqi PM Nuri Kamal made a speech before Congress in July 2006: "He was interrupted about 10 minutes into his speech by a woman wearing the trademark shade of the antiwar group Code Pink, who chanted, 'Iraqis want the troops to leave! Bring them home now!' Speaker J. Dennis Hastert halted the speech and ordered the Capitol Police to remove her."
If the town hall protesters were just hanging around protesting outside the Congressional members' offices, I don't think that would be a problem, so long as they stopped spray-painting swastikas around the office.
Seriously, no one here sees any difference between wearing an "outlandish costume" while standing outside Hastert's office, and yelling over people who are trying to speak with their Congressman?
Yeah, the line for me is exactly where the conduct disrupts the actual meeting. People can say whatever they want outside as far as I'm concerned.
CC
who does see some logic in stricter limitations on abortion clinic protesting, but could live without that exception if it really came down to it.
"Seriously, no one here sees any difference between wearing an "outlandish costume" while standing outside Hastert's office, and yelling over people who are trying to speak with their Congressman?" I don't know about Hastert's office, but are you seriously saying that Code Pink doesn't disrupt meetings? How many videos do you want to watch? Do you prefer Congressional hearings, or public meetings? Google video and YouTube have both.
Hastert had Code Pink, Immigration Rights, and all sorts of other groups...it went on for a couple of years.
Permanent Demonstrations in front of his office. The Code Pink ones stuck in my mind because they showed up at his farewell speech and one of them was right on my heels shouting in my ear about Hastert shielding pedophiles and child molesters as I was walking with my kid. That crossed a line for me.
The majority of these people were from out of district and the town of Batavia went out of its way to accommodate them despite the disruption to the business district.
Never once did Hastert condem anyone: call Americans evil mongers, or Nazi's, whatever... google the Aurora Beacon News for pictures of some the demos.
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