Well, I thought he owed an apology but that censure was overkill. I don’t know where that puts me on the spectrum, but it doesn’t set me up as a supporter of what Wilson did in any case.
Except that his apology, by his own admission was forced on him by his party leadership. Add to that, there was another injured party here: The House of Representatives who’s rules and dignity he assulted with his action. That is the party he still owes an apology to.
What dignity?
Purely for the sake of argument, I’ll play along and say “yes, the President lied.”
Give me your best here. Shoot from the hip all six barrels of your gotcha gun. How is that in any way equivalent to what Joe Wilson did?
Oddly, I am very close to agreeing with you completely. I think he deserved to “have his hand slapped” – as much to set a precedent against such behavior as to deal with him specifically. (And for the record, if Stark actually interrupted a speech by Bush, I’d say the same about him. [I don’t know the details there.] For me, it’s a matter of propriety, decorum and courtesy, not a partisan issue.) I think the actual result – admonition not censure – was the proper measured response called for. He got slapped for misbehavior; his misbehavior was not at the level of Joe McCarthy’s, and censure was slightly overkill. But no action would be condoning his behavior, saying it’s perfectly OK to turn bipartisan governance into partisan sniping. And neither Republicans nor Democrats, liberals nor conservatives, should be permitted to get away with that.
Comment?
He’s not drawing an equivalence. Still, acknowledging that Obama lied here is immaterial. Presidents tell this kind of lie constantly (“It’s great to be here in Cleveland”, “the American worker is second to none”, “we will exhaust all other options”, “I acknowledge the long and storied tradition of friendship between the United States and France”, etc.).
It’s called diplomacy.
There is a big difference between censure and disapproval. Disapproval is publicly saying you are a naughty boy. Censure removes his floor privileges. Censure would have been too much for a first offense. But to do nothing would encourage this behavior from everyone at every opportunity.
As for Mr. Moto saying they were equivalent. Yes, you definitely implied that they were the exact same thing. They were nothing of the sort.
“Diplomacy is the art of saying ‘nice doggie’ while you reach behind your back for a stick.” -Some wit whom I’d credit if I remembered who said it
I think what undercut the “apology to the chamber” issue was that it doesn’t seem like those pushing for it were really motivated by it. ISTM, based on news accounts that I read, that it was pushed by African-American congresspeople upset at a possibly racially-tinged attack on Obama, and by liberal partisans generally.
Personally I don’t see any real reason for Wilson not to apologize to the House itself. Once you admit it was wrong, what’s the difference who you apologize to? But these things sometimes have overtones that go beyond the literal words spoken, and this applies to those on one side as much as the other.
IOW, Wilson didn’t want to apologize for the same reason that others wanted him to, and it had nothing to do with the honor of the House, on either side.
It would do nothing of the sort.
As you can see from people’s reactions to this very incident, as well as any number of other similar dustups, no two incidencts are exactly alike, and partisans from either side will seize on any possible similarity or dissimilarity to compare or distinguish the two.
So maybe this might serve as a precedent, IF it’s a president addressing a joint session of congress, AND it’s an African-American president AND it’s a southern congressman with a possible history of racial insensitivity, AND he utters the specific words “you lie”, AND he apologizes to the president but refuses to apologize to the House.
And even then I doubt it.
Stark criticized Bush in a speech Stark made before the House, in which Stark had the floor and Bush wasn’t (obviously) present. The comparison, which is an implied claim that they are equivalent is absolutely bullshit and stupid beyond even the usual right wing objections that reality has a liberal bias.
Eh, he was a designated martyr before the diphthong finished leaving his yap.
Did Stark break a rule by calling Bush a liar in the House? Please consult my helpful link above.
And it is you who are asserting that I implied an equivalence. I never did anything of the sort - I just noted a recent precedent, and an oddly parallel one.
It would have been a precedent had Rep Wilson called Obama a liar from the House floor instead of yelling it out when Obama had the floor during a joint session of congress.
I have no idea how Mr. Moto sees what Stark did as a precedent for what Wilson did. It isn’t.
By that rationale an employee of a company writing an email to a coworker cursing out their CEO is a precedent for barging into a board meeting and screaming it in his face.
Are we supposed to shoot him?
Cream pies at every public meeting he holds for the next two years.
You certainly implied an equivalence. Bringing the two unrelated and nonequivalent topics up in the same post to compare them is just that. Unless you have no idea of what English language words mean. Only an idiot and a liar would believe there was no equivalence implied.
No - someone was asking about what punishment was appropriate for breaking a particular rule. It then is instructive to look at what happened to others who broke that rule - and I note again that the President need not be present for that rule to be broken.
It is clear when you examine this that sanction from this rule is haphazard, arbitrary, and applied in a partisan manner. Given this, I’m not going to get terribly upset when Republicans behave as Democrats behaved in the past - essentially standing by their member while others shout at him.
It would be nice if there was an impartial parliamentarian or speaker akin to that in the British House of Commons that could enforce the rules in a nonpartisan fashion - however, this isn’t how we do things. Here essentially the opposition has to keep the majority honest, and vice versa.
With the price of ammo these days? Pssh.
Winner! fuck it, move on.
They didn’t break the same rule. Wilson did not have the floor. He didn’t make a policy speech from the floor that broke a rule. He heckled the President, who did have the floor, at a speech before a joint session of congress.
There is no equivalency; there is no comparison; there is no precedent.