Senator Tom Coburn from Oklahoma (R.) had the guts to tell an angry, Becked-up audience of mouth-foamers in a Town Hall meeting the last thing they wanted to hear - that their political opponents are human beings too. Yes, even Nancy Pelosi:
While discussing his policy disagreements with Pelosi, Coburn said "she's a nice lady," which brought hisses and hoots from the crowd. Said Coburn: "Come on now. She is nice -- how many of you all have met her? She's a nice person. Just because somebody disagrees with you doesn't mean they're not a good person... So don't catch yourself being biased by Fox News that somebody is no good. The people in Washington are good. They just don't know what they don't know."
I can't work out which is more remarkable: that decency and common sense like this still exists in politics - and in the GOP! - or that its very existence should be remarkable.
Whatever, somebody needs to primary his ass.
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Well said, Mr. Coburn. I don't like Pelosi's decisions (usually), but I'm constantly fighting with people to consider that there's a person behind the politics. We treat our criminals better as human beings than we treat some of the people in our country who have to make the most difficult (and often unpopular) decisions. I'm the only Democrat at the dinner table when we eat with my BF's family, and we often get into heated discussions about politics; I constantly have to take the stance of "Just because they're democrats/republicans doesn't mean they're bad people - they have to make hard decisions, probably ones you wouldn't want to make yourself, so STFU."
Posted by: CDC | April 07, 2010 at 04:58 PM
Well said, CDC.
Posted by: Marbury | April 07, 2010 at 05:02 PM
but we can still say that Bush is a retarded monkey child or something, right?
or do we have to tone it down because he's not president anymore
Posted by: graham | April 09, 2010 at 04:20 AM
I love posts like this, you refer to them as "becked-up, mouth-foamers" and so become the very thing you claim to denounce.
Posted by: John Doe | April 12, 2010 at 02:54 AM
Ha, good call JD. I'm not sure my implied disdain is the same as anger but I take your point. I'd like to think, however, that my dislike of extremists applies to both sides. To take up Graham's ironically-made point, the "Bush is an idiot" crowd were just as ridiculous and ultimately self-defeating.
Posted by: Ian Leslie | April 12, 2010 at 07:08 PM
I agree that there is a lot of ignorant anger. Many in the tea party movement can't articulate what they're actually angry about, but the way to deal with people of this nature, on both sides, is to make rational arguments and try to convince them of a better truth. I'm not worried about these people, in fact, I think they're mostly harmless. I am worried by people who denounce others and dismiss them as lunatics without addressing, via reason and arguments their concerns. People like this worry me because I'm not sure what they propose as a solution. Should the fairness doctrine be used to shutdown glen beck, rush, ann coulter? Should the patriot act be used to investigate "christrian fanatics"? Should politically flavored crimes be considered "hate" crimes (right on left only of course)? I'm fearful of people that would accept a certain amount of totalitarianism because their guys happen to be in power for the moment. Those who dismiss and denounce the tea party movement forget how angry they were two years ago.
Posted by: John Doe | April 13, 2010 at 05:55 AM