The latest bobble-head demagogue named Joe
Hard to say if Joe Wilson is another Joe McCarthy. He did call the President of the United States a lair as Obama spoke to an official joint session of Congress, which is certainly a McCarthy thing to do. Don’t debate the issue, attack the individual. McCarthy, a Republican senator from Wisconsin in the early 1950s, did it by claiming the target individual, whoever it happened to be, was “a Communist.”
His act came to be known as “McCarthyism,” one of the grimiest terms in American political history. Wrote journalist/historian David Halberstam in “The Fifties:” “(McCarthy) knew instinctively how to brush aside the protests of his witnesses, how to humiliate vulnerable, scared people. In the end he produced little beyond fear and headlines.”
Joe Wilson, until this week an unknown South Carolina congressman, may or may not have those instincts, and only time will tell if he is a mouthpiece for some political operative who does. If there are any investigative reporters left in the country, I imagine they are hard at work this week, looking for such a link.
But there is another link that is obvious, and troublesome. Since Wednesday night, when Wilson shouted, “You lie!” at President Obama during his address on health care reform, the Republican right has seized on him as a hero. I say “Republican right” to distinguish that bedrock group from Republican moderates, and what several commentators (including me) have begun carefully to call “intelligent” Republicans. Rush Limbaugh and Sarah Palin speak for the Republican right; John McCain, who appears to acknowledge his 2008 miscalculation, speaks for the Republican moderates; and David Brooks is the best candidate for spokesman for intelligent Republicans.
The Republican right seems to seize on bobble-head demagogues named Joe. Last year, it was Joe the Plumber. This year, it is Joe the Congressman. Hard to believe, after the Joe the Plumber goofiness, that there could be a Joe the Congressman, but there he is, making headlines for abusing the presidential office, his office, and Congress, which makes the whole new business seem so McCarthyesque.
This time, though, not in 1952, but in 2009, it looks like a reverse McCarthyism. When he shouted out (are you there, Sarah?) on Wednesday night, Joe Wilson hoisted himself onto the shoulders of millions of citizen Joe McCarthys, growing ever more comfortable in their grassroots demagoguery, whose way around debate is to accuse the President of the United States of lying, of being un-American right down to his birth certificate, of being soft on patriotism, just as McCarthy accused all Democrats of being soft on Communism. Whether he is qualified or not, Wilson may become the new McCarthy, or McCarthy surrogate. His bearers may insist. He may have only two choices, to be the bedrock right’s voice of Wilsonism, or resign the position and be tagged a “traitor.”
The original McCarthyism imploded in 1953 when McCarthy attacked the U.S. Army with his claims of Communist “infiltration.” The hearings were nationally televised, “and when it was over,” Halberstam wrote, “McCarthy had done himself in with his ugliness.” He was censured by the Senate in 1954. He was an alcoholic and died of liver disease in 1957.
What are Americans to do about Wilsonism? It is completely necessary for Joe Wilson to be censured by the Congress. It’s too late now, but the President should have called him out on Wednesday night. Just a short, quiet, declarative sentence: “Shame on you, sir, in this house.” And Americans are represented by an active media, which should be all over this.
12 Responses to “The latest bobble-head demagogue named Joe”
[...] about Rush Limbaugh as of September 12, 2009 The latest bobble-head demagogue named Joe – themoderatevoice.com 09/12/2009 Hard to say if Joe Wilson is another Joe McCarthy. He did [...]
That “bobble-head” just got Obama to back down and include additional verification of nationality in his plan.
http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2009/09/…
As my friend put it so well:
So, is this the Whitehouse way of saying ” uh…. okay, maybe he lied a little” without actually coming right out and saying “uh … okay, maybe he lied a little”?
Wilson is a traitor to the parliamentary principals laid out in the Constitution and so are the republicans that defend him. Wilson has not properly apologized to the president, the legislature, or the American people. Especially the majority that won the last election. If he does not suffer official reproach for his outburst, then the continued disintegration of our form of government is advanced. If Wilson does not suffer repercussion for his actions, I guarantee you similar will occur should his own party ever resume power.
Leonidas,
Want to bet that after that language is removed in conference committee that no one who is coalling Rep. Wilson a demagogue is apologize and admit that he was right and that President Obama was lying to the American people.
My guess is that no matter what the final bill says and how much money will be spent on illegal aliens, that the so-called progressives will keep carrying water for the Obama Administration instead of holding them accountable for the lying.
Of course, the real reason that the Democrats are mad is that the Democratic Party loves the idea of open borders and unlimited immigration because it helps core Democratic groups such as La Raza, the public sector unions, social workers, and NGO's.
except that wilson’s real name is “addison” and the plumber’s real name is “samuel”.
i guess that still says a lot, though.
also, is no one aware that we’re already required to give medical care to illegals in some circumstances…?
Thanks for the laughs. I don't know which is funnier–the idea that calling someone who's shading the truth a liar is demagoguery (you do know that there are dictionaries online, right?), or the comment from “Father Time” that manages to call Wilson a “traitor” of sorts in commenting on his alleged “demagoguery.”
By the way, “Father Time,” the U.S. Constitution did not establish a “parliament,” but if you were even remotely familiar with “question time” in the British Parliament you'd find it quite rowdy.
Disagree, I think the Progressive wing of the democratic party is really mad because even with the presidency and a filibuster proof majority they could not convince their own party to pass healthcare reform as they thought they were entitled to. They are mad because the moderates of their own party told them to stuff it,. They can't do a damn thing about that now, since they still want those votes so they lash out at the GOP who didn't have the power to stop them had they been able to unify the democrats.
Or to put it more briefly, they are mad because the score is:
Blue Dogs 1 Progressives 0
Leonidas,
The problem with the progressives is that they have carrying too much baggage while trying to pass medical insurnace reform. Progressive really want a UK type system of nationalized health care. Progressive just do not want insurance reform but nationalization of health care. Second, progressives want to use entitlements to encourage more illegal aliens to come to the U.S. because it creates more automatic Democratic voters while creating more government jobs and more support for government handouts. Third, progressives want to kill health care as a good career field. All of the Ivy leaguers who majored in Philosophy or political science really resent the idea that a pharmacist or nurse who graduate from a state university makes more money than they do.
“Progressive really want a UK type system of nationalized health care.”
Can you provide me some examples of this? I read some progressive sites on the internat and know a few (my brother!). I see zero support for nationizing health care similar to the UK system. Certainly there is no support in Congress or even any discussion of it.
The most radical plan I have seen advanced, although it is not in any of the bills so far, is single provider, Medicare for all. This would be similar to the Canadian system, not the UKs. But even it was taken off the table and not seriously considered.
Is this another case where I shouldn't pay attention to what they say or do but to what you know Progressives, deep in their heart, really want?
I enjoyed the description of which pundits represent which segments of the GOP. My own taxonomy of Republicans is:
The complicit: A fairly small group of mostly rich and corporate interests that fully knows the goal of GOP economic policy is to increase their wealth and power at the expense of everyone else, including the other categories of Republicans. They lead other 'conservatives' with scare tactics and bigotry, appealing to their feelings of moral superiority and self importance. The complicit includes those who profit from federal spending on military adventurism, prison funding, wasteful government contracting to private enterprises like Lockheed, Blackwater, Haliburton and the thousands of other for-profit entities that exist to milk money from the government.
The sheep: This group follows, easily led by the talking points of the complicit. They buy such fictions as lowering taxes can increase government revenue, that “what's good for business is good for the country”, that “a rising tide lifts all boats” economically (even though their own boats are swamped in economic stagnation). The bigots fit in this large group too, those easily led by racist, sexist, classist, nationalistic and religious appeals as well as the frankly selfish who fear anyone “taking what's mine”.
The distracted: This includes the single issue voters (Abortion activists, homophobes, gun rights zealots) who will vote those positions regardless of any other ideology of the party.
Michael, you say Wilson called Obama “a place where wild animals go to hibernate” & Leonidas didn't even catch it.
MM
If you are really reading the progressive bloggers, you will see to inportant points: single payer and the removal of any profit motive. Look at the push for nationalizing the pharmaceutical industries. Look at the push to put health care workers on salary and to limit their income.
Physician on salary, no profit motive, and single payer = NHS. The progressives expect people to work hard to provide healthcare for low wages and in bad working conditions. Nothing really different than the NHS.