Perspective the Pest
November 5, 2009
Republican Congress people, led by Michelle Bachman and other unstable personalities, today, led an emotional protest, despite some paid participants, against President Obama and his proposed healthcare initiatives. The idea of the protest itself actually embodies the spirit of American freedom of speech, since these people, for the most part, did not have to pay for the privilege of addressing their elected representatives. The hatred, however, that is slowly brewing among these “Teabaggers” is extremely vicious and instead of tempering it, the bulk of the Republican leadership seems to be encouraging it.
By inviting protesters with signs portraying Holocaust victims as products of national health care and claiming Obama is a Nazi or communist and that he is somehow a Kenyan directing foreign ideas or that keeping millions of people from dying is somehow undesirable, the Michelle Bachmans have misrepresented the voice of most Republicans. Not only have they dealt a blow to the Party’s accountability, but they have managed to lure John Boehner and other Republican Congressional leaders into an untenable position, defending the rampant bigotry of a small wing of their party.
Underneath the senseless interference by Republicans, instead of constructive criticism, there lies an intense bigotry and, of course, ignorance. The average Republican will, in the end, seem to benefit from rational national health care reform. The poor and less educated Republicans will gain the most, yet those are the poor souls targeted by the rich Republican Congress people and the unethical insurance lobby. This strategy is not a new one, of course, it is the same one used 150 years ago to lure confederate soldiers, mostly poor and unemployed, into fighting and dying in a senseless war to protect slavery and the unethical ancestors of many of those who are now “Tea Bag” Republicans.
Those same hatreds and bigotries, flaming the fire of irrational violence, are being fanned again. Of course we need national healthcare! Of course, there is plenty of room for improvement in both House and Senate plans, but for some idiot, elected for her looks instead of her brain, to decide that giving health care to Americans is a grave threat to the American way of life is absurd. Tom Tancredo can’t masquerade as stupid, but his admonition that Obama’s healthcare initiative is more dangerous than communism or terrorism has even the banal Bachman beat!
The undercurrent of hatred initiated by the Republicans out of desperation can only lead to violence and disaster- I admonish Mr. Steele, obviously a man of moderation, to prevail upon his party leaders to follow the examples of people like Newt Gingrich, Mitt Romney and even Jeb Bush and rein in the crazies, please!
Allen Finkelstein, D.O.