Congress and Respect: A Strange Sense of Priorities

President Obama can’t catch a break when he tries to sell the United States on health care reform. Last time, all anyone wanted to talk about after his press conference was his ham-handed handling of “Gatesgate”. This morning, after Obama’s address to the joint houses of Congress, much of the ink that has been spilled has regarded only two words – and not those of Obama. All the talk has been about the Republican Representative from South Carolina, Joe Wilson, and his outburst when Obama claimed that his health care bill would not provide coverage for illegal aliens, “You lie!”

Even though the New York Times, Washington Post, and Newsweek, not to mention the major television network news couldn’t see fit to report about the racist, profanity-laden, conspiracy-theorizing words of former self described communist-radical Green Jobs Czar, Van Jones until after he was fired (and even then, attributed it to a right-wing hatchet job by Fox News’s Glenn Beck), Wilson’s words were front-page news on all the aforementioned outlets.

The hyperventilating left is having a field day. Rahm Emanuel, White House Chief of Staff, angrily confronted Republican leaders saying, “No President has ever had that happen before!” Correct me if I’m wrong, but wasn’t Mr. Emanuel a member of the House of Representatives in 2005, when Democrats booed, hissed, and shouted, “No!” when President Bush spoke about the need for social security reform? Arlen Specter, ever the opportunist, stated that Wilson should be censured. After all, as Nancy Pelosi reminded us, lawmakers can be sanctioned for calling other lawmakers liars. Let’s just forget the fact that Harry Reid did just that about President Bush on national TV. The head of the House Democratic Caucus, John Larson, is looking into sanctions against Wilson.

Now, I think that yelling during a Presidential address to Congress is boorish behavior and totally inappropriate, in spite of the fact that he was absolutely correct. Wilson should not have shouted and it was entirely appropriate that he immediately apologized. But forgive me if I don’t succumb to the vapors over this incident as have so many on the left and in the media (but I repeat myself.)

It is interesting to me what constitutes an offense sufficient for a call for censure in Congress. If Congress can censure Wilson for calling Obama a liar, why don’t they censure Obama for repeatedly calling his opponents in the health care debate liars? In last night’s speech alone, Obama stated that his opponents are spreading “bogus claims”, “tall tales”, and “demagoguery and distortion”, which is ironic, considering that his entire speech consisted of bogus claims, tall tales and demagoguery and distortion.

But I really don’t have a lot of concern for what lawmakers call each other. I find it strange, though, that while calling another lawmaker a liar is censurable, no one seems to bat an eye when lawmakers call citizens expressing their legitimate concerns “un-American”, as did Nancy Pelosi and Steny Hoyer, or “tea-baggers”, a pornographic term, as did Rep. Carol Shea-Porter (D-CA), or likening Obama opponents to the Delta fraternity in Animal House, looking to start a food fight, as did White House Press Secretary, the golden-tongued Robert Gibbs. The degree of contempt that Congress and this administration have toward the American people is remarkable.

And while we’re on the subject of censure, is Wilson’s outburst a more serious offense than Charles Rangel, head of the tax writing House Ways and Means Committee, failing to report over $1 million to the IRS? If Wilson showed disrespect to the President, doesn’t that type of blatantly illegal activity show disrespect to all those of us who pay our taxes, as required? Let’s not even get into the corruption that sticks all over Congress Critters like John Murtha, Chris Dodds, and Barney Frank.

Today, on www.Biggovernment.com, a video surfaced showing members of ACORN, counseling an undercover documentary film maker and his accomplice on how they can set up a brothel and employ children as sex workers. Let’s see how much respect Congress has for your tax dollars. If they don’t investigate ACORN, you know that they don’t care about you. All they care about is preserving their political power.

So, while lawmakers are busy getting their panties in a bunch over an admitted lack of decorum during a speech, it is business as usual, the pillaging of the national treasury for their own gains. After the 2006 mid-term elections, Nancy Pelosi vowed to “drain the swamp” of Republican corruption. It seems that the Republican swamp rats have just been replaced with Democratic weasels. It has become increasingly obvious that the only way to drain the swamp is to totally replace the entire Congress.

So, while Congress works themselves into a lather about a lack of respect of one of their members to the President, let’s not forget the lack of respect Congress has for you.