Crossposted from Flopping Aces
What an embarrassment of a man, let alone a politician:
Michelle Malkin notes some recent idiocy from Rep Stark in the past:
Rep. Fortney “Pete†Stark (D-Calif.) is the foul-mouthed poster boy for Liberal Double Standards.
There he was on Capitol Hill last week, sounding more like Eminem than an eminent lawmaker, hurling epithets such as “fruitcake†and “c–ks—-r†at Republicans during a mark-up session on pension funds legislation of all things.
Most of the mainstream media coverage of the fracas has focused on the handling of the meeting by House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Bill Thomas , who is accused by Democrats of summoning Capitol Hill police to the scene in order to prevent them from meeting in a committee library to discuss procedural objections.
But while Beltway types squabble about whether Thomas was technically out of order, Stark’s blatantly thuggish behavior has once again gotten a pass from the establishment Left.
According to an official committee transcript, Stark physically taunted fellow Ways and Means Committee member Scott McInnis (R-Colorado) while Thomas attempted to hold a voice vote on the bill at hand. In response to McInnis’ demand that Thomas be quiet while the bill was being read, Stark blurted out: “[O]h, you think you are big enough to make me, you little wimp? Come on. Come over here and make me. I dare you.â€
Further goading McInnis, a married Republican gentleman, Stark lashed out: “You little fruitcake. You little fruitcake. I said you are a fruitcake.†According to Fox News Channel, witnesses say Stark then hurled a 10-letter homophobic insult at Thomas better suited for an anti-gay rap records than the Congressional Record. Stark’s press office refused to answer my questions on the record about these remarks…
She then reminds us of his phone call to an enlisted man just returned from Kosovo in which he blew up on him when he dared to write him a letter critical of his job performance:
Stark stooped to name-calling, chastising his constituent as an idiot: “Probably somebody put you up to this, and I’m not sure who it was, but I doubt if you could spell half the words in the letter and somebody wrote it for you. So I don’t pay too much attention to it.â€
Near the middle of his rambling message, the Congressman promised Dow, “But I’ll call you back later.†Why? Stark explained, “[To] let you tell me why you think you’re such a great, god-damned hero.†(Stark did not call back.)
House Republican Whip Roy Blunt had this to say in response to Starks lunacy:
“Pete Stark’s statements on the House floor this afternoon crossed all lines of decency and decorum. As a member of Congress, he should be ashamed. But as a senior member of the Ways and Means Committee – and the current chairman of its Health subcommittee – the Democratic leadership ought to be ashamed as well.
“To claim our men and women in Iraq are serving there for the president’s own personal enjoyment – and worse, to suggest he’s actually ‘amused’ by the image of soldiers being killed – represents a crass appeal to the worst, most base elements of our population. It dishonors the continued sacrifice of our troops in the field, and disrespects their family and friends at home who pray for their safe return. The Democratic leadership should denounce these comments immediately, and Mr. Stark should apologize for making them as well.â€
In the end, after all of his over the top comments the House failed to over-ride the veto, thankfully, and now maybe the Democrats will stop show boating and actually send a bill that will get signed this time. They knew this thing would never become law. Instead of actually getting something done they decided the better route would be to get some photo-ops with little kids telling the country that Republicans are meanies because we don’t see the need for a couple making 80 grand a year to get taxpayer help.
UPDATE
The Republicans have put up an alternative that actually makes sense, unlike the Democrats version:
Their alternative, based on a proposal crafted by the Heritage Foundation, consists of three elements:
1) A full reauthorization of SCHIP. The program would continue to cover children in families with incomes at or below 200% of the federal poverty level;
2) A child health care tax credit. Rather than putting more people on a government-run program, the legislation advances tax credits to families with incomes between 200% and 300% of the poverty level; and
3) A health care “federalism†initiative. This piece would complement both the reauthorization and the tax changes in expanding health care coverage, and would encourage even more dramatic health care experimentation at the state level with different approaches to coverage expansion.
Democrats, including Speaker Nancy Pelosi, have supported the idea of a tax credit, and others, such as Sen. Jeff Bingaman ☼ (D-N.M.) and Rep. Tammy Baldwin ☼ (D-Wis.), have offered legislation supporting the “federalism†approach.
But will a common sense alternative be good enough for the Democrats?
UPDATE II
Great post at Redstate on Nancy Pelosi’s failure, once again:
The truly astounding part of all of this was how simply you could have avoided it. As our own Bluey adeptly noted, you were told, point-blank, by Rep. Deborah Price that the Republicans that voted for this bill originally expected that people would sit down and come up with something that addressed both sides of the issue, not the petty political desires of your faction. We were well into the “haggling over the price” phase of the legislation; you tried for $50 billion extra and had already gone down to $35 billion, so let us not pretend that you could not have gone down further. A compromise of $15 to $20 billion would have easily kept the bill’s current supporters and sliced off enough opponents to overturn the veto. Plus, you’d have given the President a stinging defeat on a domestic policy. Plus, you’d have looked like the reasonable one in this dispute.
But you didn’t do any of that – you raised, we called, and you had garbage in your hand.
This speaker will go down as one of the worst of the worst. Way to go Nancy!
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