Re: American Mob

Easy, in one cascade of the "Angry Mob" Talking Points, we have the charge that citizens were solely at these Town Hall meetings to disrupt or interrupt the proceedings and stifle discussion of the issues.

Booing and hissing and stomping your feet in solidarity with your fellow citizens at a meeting with your government representatives is not a disruption, an interruption, nor a stifling of a discussion of the issues. Senate and House representatives have a huge megaphone to state their position on the issues, and de facto and de jure power to impose their opinions on everyone else.

As such, it is entirely impossible that a small group of citizens could do anything at any single Town Hall meeting to infringe on a politician's ability to "discuss" the issues. The only question is whether the people will gain a voice on important matters. If the people, for whatever reason, decide in these meetings that shouting their reps down is the best way to get their attention, then that is their right and privilege as citizens to do so.

Maybe it won't work and maybe it will, but that is a matter for political strategists and pundits, and in a few years, historians. But in any event, the politicians - of all people! - have no right at all to criticize citizens for expressing their opinions in whatever way they wish, in the few arenas the elite political class allows them.

That's why I truly respect those politicians, like Claire McCaskill, whom I vehemently disagree with on many, many issues. She has been willing to stand up in these meetings, take the abuse, and has not gone out later to a compliant media to denigrate the citizens of her state.

As for the rest of the Democratic Party, I say Man Up! This is a democracy, not a knitting society.

You know, it might help you Democrats to get out of Washington and go to Britain. Although old and sadly weighed down by its history, Parliament still shows a bit of the old spirit when the Prime Minister shows up to explain his policies. If the moment is controversial enough you will hear from the opposition party loud booing, hissing, catcalls, interruptions, disruptions, denigrations, snide comments, outright slanders ... my God, it's a sight! Free people, in opposition and out of power, daring to oppose the current rulers, in their own way, in their own words!

And then come back here and realize what a privilege it is to serve the people of this country, where the old spirit of Liberty is not fading, but vibrant and real.