Oh Dear Our National Conversation Has Turned Into a Pub Brawl - in 2 parts

Part I

There was an article on HuffingtonPost.com today that was accompanied by video of a Jewish man speaking highly of the Israeli health care plan. While this man was speaking a woman started yelling HEIL HITLER. I can almost not find the the words to comment on this.

The national conversation on health care come to this. My friends on the left will lay it all squarely on the extreme right and the not so extreme right. They have a valid point. On the extreme right we have have the junky radio top talker saying the President is using Nazi tactics and following National Socialist programs. We have Glen Beck saying the President openly hates white people, we have Ms. Palin saying the health care plan would kill her baby and neglect her parents. Then there are all the birthers, death panelists and town hall shouters carrying loaded guns and holding up antisemitic and racist posters.


On the not so extreme right we have long time Sen. Grassley talking about pulling the plug on grandma, Orin Hatch voting against a woman he voted for twice before, Newt supporting Palin and her almost insane statements. Are there no moderates left in the Republican party?


If I were truly a hard core liberal Democrat I would stop there but I do try to be fair. There are those on the left that have not made me proud of my side of the issues. Cong. Nadler saying the shouters are fascist, Leader Reid and Speaker Pelosi questioning the patriotism of the loudest of the shouters. The liberals have thrown the Nazi references around aplenty.


Things do seem to be calming a bit. Maybe the media realized it has over covered the story, maybe leadership is pulling back because they realize they may go too far or maybe people are getting turned off by the crazies and beginning to fight back. I think the President's recent tour has helped to calm things down. People could see that town hall meetings could occur without all the shouting and histrionics. Even the people who really disagree with President Obama seemed respectful. Maybe it was the power of the office and maybe when the man himself was in the same room with them, they realized this might not be the place to boo, taunt, shout and generally act out.

So, this is what has become modern political discourse. Can it get worse? I sometimes think that something really tragic has to happen in order for people to take a step back and take a hard look in the mirror. I won't suggest here what that tragedy could be - those are words I cannot bring myself to write.

Part II - How did we get to this place.