Joe Wilson and the conservative id
"You lie" as a symptom of the times we live in
Joe Wilson and the conservative id
Dick Polman, Inquirer National Political Columnist
At this point, congressman Joe Wilson's boorish personal insult - an unprecedented fit of insolence that violated several centuries of House protocol - has sufficiently saturated the airwaves. The moment itself need not be further recounted here. But there is still much to be said about the moment as metaphor.
In a narrow sense, the moment was truly shocking. No previous congressman in 220 years had personally insulted the president of the United States to his face during a House proceeding. Mickey Edwards, a retired Republican congressional leader, was sufficiently shocked to write that Wilson's behavior marked "a new low in politics," because "any real congressman would have known that such behavior is not permitted in a place where members are not allowed to call even other members liars without being publicly and officially rebuked." Indeed, even the typically raucous British Parliament does not permit such personal attacks; when one member calls another a liar or a coward or a traitor, or other words that are officially deemed "unparliamentary," the offender is promptly asked to withdraw the insult.
Nevertheless, in the broader scheme of things, the spectacle of a right-wing back-bencher behaving like a horse's ass was not shocking in the least. Joe Wilson wasn't doing anything new; he was behaving as so many of his brethren have behaved since the rise of Barack Obama. Because deep down they refuse to accept Obama as their legitimate leader, they naturally don't feel that they owe him the requisite respect.
This was clear even during the '08 campaign, when conservative crowds yelled things like "Traitor" and "Kill him," and no Republican bigwigs said a word about it. This was clear when liars insisted he was a Muslim. This was clear during the summer of '09. when liars insisted yet again that he was an illegitimate president who had been born on foreign soil. This was clear last spring when a Republican activist in South Carolina (Joe Wilson's state) joked that a gorilla that had escaped from a local zoo was probably one of Michelle Obama's ancestors.
So when Wilson yelled "You lie!" he was merely giving spontaneous voice to the current conservative id. Which is precisely why Republican leaders on Capitol Hill insisted that Wilson apologize; they were not comfortable seeing their most visceral emotions expressed so openly by one of their own. After all, that kind of exposure is so counterproductive; thanks to Wilson's outing of the true conservative attitude, Republicans over the past 36 hours have been forced to play defense. The Wilson story has stolen attention from the Obama health plan - and the legitimate policy questions about how to pay for it. Moreover, since Wedneasday night, Wilson's 2010 Democratic opponent has raised $700,000 from 20,000 ticked-off donors.
No, the elected Republicans would prefer that their true feelings not be exposed. They believe it's far more prudent to let Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh do all the heavy ranting, to let the town-hall foot soldiers lie with impunity and paint swastikas on Obama's photo. This way, the elected Republicans can lend their tacit support by simply remaining mum.
Such is the continued devolution of civic discourse in America. The incident on the House floor put it all in perspective. Actually, Wilson did us a favor. He cracked open the window, and gave us a peek inside the conservative mind. Thanks, Joe.
But wait...Let us not forget that his ire was also fueled by his stalwart opposition to what his website calls "government-run health care." It is certainly true that the plight of the uninsured is not exactly high on Wilson's priority list. Basically, he can't relate. Why not? Because Wilson, as a retired Army National Guard colonel, receives free medical coverage for life. Paid for by a government-run health care program.
So now we can add hypocrisy to the mix. Thanks for nothing, Joe.
I hear the heatlchare bill will pass by Thanksgiving. That means we have the rest of September, all of October, and most of November to hear Obama's healthcare pitch 37 more times. Thank god for football is all I can say.- My brother was in a serious accident in Canada and a Canadian doctor saved his hand.— pagoda
- I lost a finger in Germany and a German doctor sowed it back on
Comment removed.- So, Mikey, doctors don't have enough to do, now they should be immigration officers too? THAT would do wonders for the quality of medical care...— Yersinia Pestis
- Speaking of devolution, I don't know why the President doesn't just pay for healthcare the same way Bush paid for the wars. Obama seems to think he should do the responsible thing, when Bush set the precedent: act unilaterally and disregard congress, the public, the economy, the budget. Problem solved. Unintended consequences? That's a problem for the next administration. That's post-9/11 democracy.
- swedesboromike: I am sure that you would prefer that they be called Grand Wizards. That would make you and all your friends in your white sheets and hoods feel right at home.— mxlplk
- The sanctions in pending legislation against illegal immigrants getting federally subsidized health insurance are just as effective as the rules forbidding employers to employ illegals. Do the republicans really want to open the "effective sanction" can of worms? Republicans do not really want to discourage illegal immigration--they have proved this many times over.— liberal
- It's hard to support a healthcare bill if it doesn't include a verification of legal citizenship provision. I'm against providing healthcare insurance(not ER care) for illegal immagrants. I'm sure a large percentage of the people would agree with this. Checking status must be a part of this bill.— James TL
- Ah yes............ more of those 'FISCALLY CONSERVATIVE' proposals: "A House oversight committee reviewed six state Medicaid programs in 2007 and found that verification rules had cost the federal government an additional $8.3 million. They caught exactly eight illegal immigrants."— the stupid does burn
- Hey Buddy, hey buddy, I relaize you were thorwn from your car, thorugh your front windshiled and into the street and rushed here unconscious from your accident. Well, I need you to wake up. Come on now, because you don't have ID on you, pehaps it was in your car? I don;t know, but there is no one here to vouch for you, but we need to prove your a citizen before I work on you, so snap out of it will ya!" For the life of me I can't figure out why the dems would shoot down such an absolutely ridiculous suggestion to prove citizenship prior to care. Perhaps, we should tatoo or brand all american citizens with their social security number, or their driver's liscence number, or pout a bar code on them so the Dr. can just scan them in and confirm citizenship. Maybe next time a republican stnad up in front of Congress we should just yell "You, Stupid".— gee1971
- mxlplk- congratulations. You've obviously read page one of the liberal playbook. The Obama regime has more czars than Russia ever had but I'm a racist for pointing that out. Nice! anything else in that shallow hole in between your ears?
- One of the most enthusiastic endorsements of Wilson’s histrionics came from the Sons of Confederate Veterans (SCV), a group that Wilson has belonged to according to his own biographical materials. The organization’s political newsletter, The Southern Mercury was transformed into a propaganda mill for crude white supremacist cant. Mailed to all dues-paying members of the SCV until it folded in 2008, the Mercury published articles describing blacks as genetically inferior to whites, calling African-Americans as “a childlike people,” and warned that if Obama runs for re-election, race riots of an “exceedingly violent nature” would immediately ensue, leaving “entire sections of some of our cities in ruins.”— the stupid does burn
- liberal- I think you are missing the point. What I was pointing out is that illegals will be given healthcare under the Obama plan. So his rhetoric the other night was a lie. No one is ever going to be refused healthcare at an emergency room. so technically under any plan, people here illegally do get healthcare as do the uninsured. Perhaps we are arguing semantics
- Here are a few highlights from the Southern Mercury: “After the turn of the 20th century, the white Southerners had disfranchised and segregated the blacks, in perhaps the mildest reaction possible at that time to the blacks’ transgressions. The blacks—then a childlike people—had been selling their votes to the Democrats en masse for $.25 apiece in national elections.” —“Where We Stand Now, And How We Got Here,” by Frank Conner, Southern Mercury, September/October 2003 “Previously, anthropologists had routinely recorded the notable differences in IQ among the races; but at Columbia, a liberal cultural anthropologist named Franz Boas…decreed that there were no differences in IQ among the races, and the only biological differences between the blacks and whites were of superficial nature… Meanwhile, the liberals in the media heaped special praise upon black athletes, musicians, singers, and writers—and treated them as typical of the black race. The liberals were creating a false image of the blacks in America as a highly competent people who were being held back by the prejudiced white Southerners.” —Conner, September/October 2003 “It is very clear to me that if Barack Obama should be elected President, he would be extremely anti-white and would demand reparations for slavery and press hard for affirmative action to the degree that it would hurt young whites who were seeking jobs or admission to College and Graduate Schools.” —“Americans Face The Worst Presidential Candidates In History,” by Robert Slimp, Southern Mercury, May/June 2008 “I believe that [Obama’s] rhetoric and anti-white legislative proposals would stir up racial riots. If he were running for re-election, these riots would turn into an exceedingly violent nature that would seriously damage race relations in America, and leave entire sections of some of our cities in ruins.” —Slimp, May/June 2008— the stupid does burn
Cited by the Columbia Journalism Review as one of the nation's top political reporters, and lauded by the ABC News political website as "one of the finest political journalists of his generation," Dick Polman is a national political columnist at the Philadelphia Inquirer. He is on the full-time faculty at the University of Pennsylvania, as "writer in residence." Dick has been a frequent guest on C-Span, MSNBC, CNN, NPR and the BBC. He covered the 1992, 1996, 2000, and 2004 presidential campaigns.
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