Last night Fox commentaters Mort and Charles — Kondracke and Krauthammer respectively — let it all hang out about town hall protestors. Mort got very excited, blinking disapproval at twice the usual rate, and Charles called the town-hallers’ display of indignation “a mistake,” as if GOP strategists had called the shot, one that cost the Republicans popularity during the past week by deflecting attention from the presumably unpopular Dem health-care initiative or “reform,” as they call it.
When Charles noted that GOP Sen. McConnell, minority leader, had said the demos were a bad idea, Mort spouted, “Oh come on!” which did much for the panel’s calm exchange of ideas. Did Mort think he was in a Tea Party town hall? He got indignant and excited over other people getting indignant and excited. McConnell should have got indignant and excited too — he did this once in fourth grade but gave it up as a bad idea — Mort apparently thinks.
The Republican party is “afraid of Rush Limbaugh,” further spouted Mort — are things going bad at Roll Call, where he works? Something must explain his unbridled indignation and excitement at this grass-roots indignation and excitement by taxpayers.
It was a “bad idea,” Charles said, as if the RNC had got the idea and acted on it. Charles also, albeit without indignation and excitement, was chastising citizens who just don’t know how to act. They are not his kind of people, it is become clear. Their kids don’t go to Harvard, for one thing. Tsk, tsk.
Later: What the heck was Charles talking about, it being bad strategy to go ballistic at town halls, in view of this from Rasmussen?
Public support for the health care reform plan proposed by President Obama and congressional Democrats has fallen to a new low as just 42% of U.S. voters now favor the plan. That’s down five points from two weeks ago and down eight points from six weeks ago.
A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey shows that opposition to the plan has increased to 53%, up nine points since late June.
More significantly, 44% of voters strongly oppose the health care reform effort versus 26% who strongly favor it. Intensity has been stronger among opponents of the plan since the debate began
Support for Congressional Health Care Reform Falls to New Low – Rasmussen Reports\
This shows no diminution of anti-reform sentiment, as Charles (and I suppose Mort, though his bluster makes it hard to figure) claimed.
Blithe Spirit 
Here’s hoping Mort and Charles come down from their mountain top long enough to read this. I so weary of pompous, pugnacious pundits. How about they come down from the comfort of the stands, and get bloodied in the arena!
LikeLike
Well said, Jack!
LikeLike
Exactly what are ordinary people, the citizens these arrogant public servants “serve,” supposed to do to get answers to their real concerns?
Calls and e-mails get form letters in return restating their opinions that run counter to what the majority of people want done.
Just like the Amnesty betrayals, the stimulus bill, Cap & Trade. We, the taxpayers, tell them “No” and they go ahead by stealth and betray our interests — always to help “the poor.” Damned if the white middle class isn’t about to become poor after decades of hard work and careful saving for old age. Not only poor, but dead earlier as a cost-containment issue. Charles and Mort wonder about the booing? Lucky it wasn’t lynching happening at these meetings.
I miss the good old days when rotten eggs and tomatoes would routinely be thrown at legislators who got too full of themselves.
Sadly, civilized behavior gets us nowhere.
LikeLike
Here’s what Boris Pasternak writes in Doctor Zhivago: “Health is ruined by the systematic duplicity forced on people if you say the opposite of what you feel, if you grovel before what you dislike and rejoice at what brings you nothing but misfortune….”
But we should take heart. Mr. O says he’s not for killing off grandma.
O, Frank Capra and Preston Sturgess, where are you?
LikeLike
Not the grandma he threw under the bus anyhow. What a guy.
Sp: Make it “Sturges” w/o 2nd “s”
LikeLike
Tonight a Fox News listener sent a comment suggesting that Kondracke and Krauthammer get out into the real world and away from Washington, D.C. This came after both were criticized by Rush Limbaug as to their less than complimentary comments made the night before about those of us who are sincere about not wanting a govenment run health care system.
I wasn’t surprised with Mort’s comment, but I did disagree with Charles when he suggested that Republican disruption of townhall health care discussion would backfire. Krauthammer might be a psychiatrist, but even psychiatrist can make poor judgements into how the human mind works and functions.
There is real passion about Obamacare, and this passion is coming from all sides of the political spectrum. Mort and Charles have not yet caught on.
LikeLike
I have to add a codicil to that last one. Yes, “passion” is the operative word. But passion usually means more heat than light. I was recently sent an email from one of the shouters which listed 25 attack-points about the plan (I assume straight out of GOP headquarters). In any case, all 25 were EXCERPTS from the current legislation. Anyone knows excerpts can be used to proved anything (you can use Biblical excerpts to prove there is no God!). A lawyer friend and I went down the entire list of twisted attacks. Do you know what happened…? The senders — I presume preferring fears to facts — never took the time or the guts to reply. I’m on Medicare so I’m not a bystander when I suggest real dissent calls for real civic responsibility, not Bear crowds animality. Maybe we can still all get it right…
LikeLike