Facebook
Fark
Digg
Reddit
StumbleSUN EDITORIAL:
There is no comparison
Republicans lamely try to link Wilson’s ‘You lie!’ outburst with Reid remark
Sunday, Sept. 20, 2009 | 2:05 a.m.
Republicans and their media mouthpieces are scrambling to find excuses for the utter lack of decorum displayed by Rep. Joe Wilson, R-S.C., when he directed his now infamous “You lie!” outburst at President Barack Obama during the president’s Sept. 9 health care address before a joint session of Congress.
One lame strategy advocated by the National Republican Senatorial Committee and the likes of GOP cheerleader Sean Hannity of Fox News Network and Rep. Trent Franks, R-Ariz., has been to draw parallels between Wilson’s unprofessional behavior and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, the Nevada Democrat who called President George W. Bush a liar in 2002.
But there is no comparison.
Reid appropriately called Bush a liar because the Republican president promised Nevadans on the campaign trail in 2000 that he would rely on “sound science, not politics” in determining whether to support a proposed dump at Yucca Mountain for the nation’s high-level nuclear waste. But Bush, once elected, quickly threw his support behind the dump, choosing the politics favored by powerful nuclear energy lobbyists.
Bush ignored a mountain of evidence showing that the federal government failed to use sound science in trying to prove the safety of the proposed repository 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
There is no question that Bush lied.
Wilson, though, was flat wrong in claiming that Obama lied when telling Congress and the American people that his health care plan would not cover illegal immigrants. Obama told the truth.
Reid issued his remarks through the news media. Wilson, though, rudely interrupted Congress’ invited guest, the president of the United States, during his nationally televised speech.
The NRSC, Hannity and Franks also whined that Wilson apologized, but Reid had not done the same to Bush. Once again, the Republicans used faulty logic.
There never was a need for Reid to apologize because he was telling the truth about Bush’s two-faced stand on Yucca Mountain.
Wilson apologized — weakly — only after being forced by party leaders to do so. When it comes to calling a president a liar, Wilson has no peer.
Discussion: comments so far…
Comments are moderated by Las Vegas Sun editors. Our goal is not to limit the discussion, but rather to elevate it. Comments should be relevant and contain no abusive language. Comments that are off-topic, vulgar, profane or include personal attacks will be removed. Full comments policy. Additionally, we now display comments from trusted commenters by default. Those wishing to become a trusted commenter need to verify their identity or sign in with Facebook Connect to tie their Facebook account to their Las Vegas Sun account. For more on this change, read our story about how it works and why we did it.
Only trusted comments are displayed on this page. Untrusted comments have expired from this story.
No trusted comments have been posted.
Post a comment
Most Popular
- Viewed
- Discussed
- E-mailed
- UNLV can move forward without the burden of losing streak to San Diego State
- A wife’s wisdom shows birth control issue needn’t be divisive
- Surprise links, negotiated deals addressed by commissioners
- Motorcycle accident claims life of man in northeast valley
- Hope and change and … what’s missing?
- New York mayor has the right idea
- We don’t need a CEO in charge
- Paying our own way
- Country has ‘given’ citizens a lot
- Jerry Tarkanian: Mike Moser impresses yet again on a day to remember former Rebel greats
Blogs
The Kats Report
Color from scene at Thomas & Mack: We have a wire job! Rebels win, and Louie Armstrong sings!
South Point owner Michael Gaughan's take on 'Vegas Stripped': 'I'll give it an 8' (4 Comments)
Author relishes writing the life story of ‘larger-than-life’ Oscar Goodman (3 Comments)
Elsewhere
Landowner: All roads could lead to Uxbridge casino
Revel reveals smoke-free casino opening
Cirque du Soleil show in Sands China casino to close this month
Meet the woman behind Sheldon Adelson
The Sun
Locally owned and independent for more than 50 years.
Decorum in the House and in Committees
Under clause 1(a)(1) of Rule XI, the rules of the House are the rules of its committees as far as applicable. Consequently, Members should comport themselves with the rules of decorum and debate in the House and in Committees specifically with regard to references to the President of the United States as stated in Section 370 of the House Rules and Manual.
As stated in Cannon's Precedents, on January 27, 1909, the House adopted a report in response to improper references in debate to the President. That report read in part as follows:
"It is... the duty of the House to require its Members in speech or debate to preserve that proper restraint which will permit the House to conduct its business in an orderly manner and without unnecessarily and unduly exciting animosity among its Members or antagonism from those other branches of the Government with which the House is correlated.
a member could not:
call the President a "liar."
call the President a "hypocrite."
describe the President's veto of a bill as "cowardly."
charge that the President has been "intellectually dishonest."
refer to the President as "giving aid and comfort to the enemy."
refer to alleged "sexual misconduct on the President's part."
Note that these rules are 100 years old. Note, too, that they do not apply outside the walls of Congress, which is where Reid made his accusation. Lastly, they do not apply to Senators.
2 things happened after Joe Wilson called Obama a liar.
1. SAVE which was taken out of the bill, was put back into the bill by Friday of that week.
2. Joe Wilson apologized to Obama.
In my mind Joe Wilson did the right thing, he just didn't do it in the right place, at the right time.
Why didn't any other House Member bring this up at any other time? Why didn't Obama bring this up? Was Joe wilson the only House Member that read the bill?
Instead of the racial slant brought into the conversation, the media should be questioning Obama and the House members who did nothing to bring what Joe did to light.
Are we sure that our prez and these House members are "of the people for the people"? I believe Joe Wilson is.
Bush is a proven liar as are his tools -CriminalCheney and the boys. Reid's calling him one was a true fact as compared to the racist Joe Wilson's calling Obama one which in fact was and is a lie. War, torture and spying on his own people, all illegal - read the 1994 Treaty the US signed, or does that mean anthing?. He was a dump of a person prior to his crooked election win doing cocaine and living drunk and was AWOL. Sen George Allen lost his senate run by his racism being exposed in calling a person a makaka and certainly we all know Rep. Joe Wilson is a piece of trash for calling our Pres. a liar. Rebel Yell Flag Confederate from South Carolina, no less. Tank tops, flip flops and chewing tobacco and no teeth is this guy's constituency no less in straw hats. What does he take us for? This is why this nation is in shambles and almost went into the tubes with these kinds of idiots at the helm. Rebublicans like McCain offering us Palin as a VP and Bush nomination Harriet Myers as a Supreme Court Justice - more absurd than a BatMan Comic Book upside down in the mirror. His lousy C average at Yale (he got in because of his Dad who bought him in and because of his name) that he boasted about in a first term speech said a lot - if he'd gotten a C at MIT or Harvard his arse would have been kicked out. Now his brother Jeb is lining up for a run for the White House. We are in trouble with this one, too. Another war monger and one who like the Criminal Bush wants to give Social Security to Wall Street. Live with that idiots who support these jerk criminals. China came very close to a financial Pearle Harbor attack by taking over our largest desposit banks and thereby controling each and everything financil including the funding of our military. I am relatively confident that conservatives would quickly approve 'Chinese Bodies of Financial Awakening' as they decided who got money and how much (shipping, airlines and railroads immediately being cut to one half), sitting in their conference rooms in the Capitol, yeap, the Republicans would be speaking all over the place about how the Dems couldn't manage and now the Chinese have had to step in and take over our country financially. A Bush tax cut of 1.2Trillion and 700Million on a criminal war and these stupidos are yelling at the Dems. Wake up Bush supporting idiots and go to Texas where the idiots there are promising to seceed from the Union. The collective IQ
Okay fos, i respect your comment but please enlighten me how Joe Wilsons' statement was racist. I believe that his statement shocked Obama and the House enough to make them put SAVE back into the bill, "you lie" has no racial undertone whatsoever.
fos the only idiots in this picture were the politicians who would have let this bill go through and the one who would have signed this bill without SAVE in its contents.
So now the LV Sun has gotten to the heart of their insipid arguement.
When DEMOCRAT Too Big to Fail Senator Harry Reid called PRESIDENT Bush a liar it was appropriately because he was a Republican for Yucca.
When DEMOCRATS Clinton (the man who dug the tunnel at Yucca) and Jimmy Carter (the man who fathered Yucca because he did not want to recycle spent fuel) we heard nothing from Harry Reid.
Then the LV Sun actually said that "Wilson, though, was flat wrong in claiming that Obama lied when telling Congress and the American people that his health care plan would not cover illegal immigrants"
Well the LV Sun missed the mad scamble by Democrats to change their bill to include enforcement - something that to date they had steadfastly voted down.
The liar here is the LV Sun
Hey LV SUN...
It's done, over, finished. GET OVER IT!!!
"There is no question that Bush lied." I for one question that assumption.
Just more Bush bashing from the LV SUN...;
Where's that weetard pigeon bird on this one? probably doing what pigeons do best' crapping all over everything.
I find this editorial to be racist, very bigoted and hateful.
Wilson called Obama a "liar". Good!So it was in the Chamber where everyone could hear--good!
Get off your hypocritical high horses and get real. Obama and his administration,plus many congressional lunatics are trying to shove a pig of a health care plan down the throats of the unaccepting masses of Americans and we are angry.
Wilson is angry, and he broke the Chamber rules.
That's the way it goes!!Get after Rangle for being a tax cheat while you're at it. This article is a great example of kool aid drinking liberal crap.
Bush lied to us over and over again. Why did the media let him get away with it? Why? He ended up ruining our country.
BTW, I am not a democrat and I did not vote for Obama.
Brian--after Bush left there was still more ruining of Americal that was elgible--we are witnessing what a lunatic liberal government can do now. I would say that as long as America has the will to fight on and fight back against dictators and Marxists in the government that there is no way that America is "ruined".
fosimmon and Brian... GET A Life...
Bush is no longer President...
Show me one politician who has not told the truth occasionally...
Notice how I did not use the word, LIE...
You party zealots are all the same...
Smear, name call, swear, put downs...
Do you like what you see when you look in a mirror?
And fosimmon, for your information, Texas is doing well and a lot of retirees are moving there to get away from people that think like you. Have you ever heard of state rights???
Yucca Mountain is a sound investment for Nevada and creates work for Nevada. The revenues Nevada would receive would be in the billions. For Reid to call bush a liar is like Americans saying Democrats are fiscally responsible.
On the other hand for Wilson to say to Obama "You Lie" is a proven fact. Obama is a liar and the sad part is you liberals wouldn't know liar if it smacked you upside the head. Liberals have been infamous liars for so many years you don't know the truth from your lies. You've been raised on the one of the biggest stings in the history of the world. Think of the movie "The Sting" is feels so real yet it is a scam, this would be your life.
When liberals become honest and responsible for their choices and actions then just maybe you'd be taken seriously. Until this time occurs, you have no value or use to most of America and your true colors are showing.
Sit back and look in the mirror and ask for forgiveness today, after all it is Sunday. If you ask, god will forgive you for all your sins.
Harry Reid will be irrelavant after 2010.
Well, more so than he is now--he can them join the "Sun" as a true staffer, an unofficial position he holds now.
People are not stupid, they know what is happening to them and who is responsible for it.
Harry Reid is wearing a great big political bulls eye on his back and voters will aim there ballots dead center.
He is gone, and good riddance to a spiteful self serving career politician.
As for the LV Sun, unlike the newspaper that delivers it to its few remaining readers, it will carry on for a few more years as an insert--till it too becomes just another blog.
But I don't wish it on you, I don't harbor the vitriol of Senator Reid who wishes the LV Review Journal go out of business. If only because Brian Greenspun needs to maintain a hobby platform where he can post those brilliant editorials that the lefties love so much.
Trouble is, this is Nevada Brian. The West...not your coffee house in Berekely.
NEWS ALERT!!!
The Las Vegas SUN has just announced that they sent a couple of reporters to the local ACORN office to confirm that ACORN is beyond reproach.
To be fair and impartial, the SUN reporters gave the local ACORN office two days notice before their arrival and a request for a copy of ACORN's talking points.
The Sun reporters could find no irregularities in the local practices of the ACORN office. The reporters, reviewed several boxes of voter registration forms and were amused that so many new voters are named Mickey Mouse.
The Sun reporters were very impressed with the framed photographs of Harry and Nancy flanking the hand painted picture of the SEIU President.
After a photo op and in appreciation of the visit, ACORN officials gave each reporter a free pack of cigarettes and a lovely ACORN t-shirt.
To sum it up, the reporters stated that a good time was had by all...
Call 911.
The Sun has a massive OD on koolaid.
Fellow idiots. Go to the Delaware Air Base in Dover and watch the caskets arrive. CriminialBush and his tools of the 'policestate' will be with us for years and years. When you leave there go to Walter Reed in DC and visit those guys. Nobody's getting over anything when CriminalBush should be tried at the Hague along with his tools of war, spying and torture. What weapons of mass destruction - where? Does this include outing a CIA agent? That's called treason unless you're one of the BushCriminals. How stupidly low can we go in this country? Idiotic and stupid ... listen to Cheney, Wolfowitz, Rummie and those crazies. They could fit right into the Third Reich and not miss a beat. LIARS. They care about their egos and pocketbooks and that's it. Have I heard one of those criminals support our President? NO. One thing about our nation is we just don't feel like justice applies out our administrations, they can do whatever they want and lie it away on our guys blood. Many Democrats, too, are very much interested in the profitability of their lovely offices. By the way, has Bush and Group given Social Security to GoldmanSacs yet? Wouldn't that have been fun, fighting your way into Smiths for some groceries through hundreds of seniors begging for some pennies to survive on. Idiots, we are idiots for having elected that CriminalBush, the drunk, coke head and all those DUI's and AWOL, too. My vote went to Gore and ANYBODY opposed to CriminalBush. Now, go out and have a nice day thanks in part to Roosevelt and Johnson and Clinton. Reagan was the one who started the defecits. Thank him on your way to the tax office (low and middle class folks had to pay for the lost gap) to support the tax cut for the rich and the illegal war expense. Next piece I shall endeavor to discuss stem cell research (science set back many years by not allowing sufficient stem cell research under CriminalBush's Admisistration) under CriminalBush and Katrina, the sleeping SEC and The Corporation of The FAA, owned, operated and staffed by U.S. Airlines.
Hey fosdick... When you say "Fellow idiots." Are you including yourself? I hope so.
Two words for your rant: WHO CARES...
You don't sound like a veteran, but if you are, please pay a visit to the VA and seek some help.
You my friend are a few bricks short of a full load. A few cards short of a full deck. And just not wrapped too tight.
LOOK OUT!!! I think someone is following you...
LOL....good catch on that "Fellow idiots" statement..LarryVegas.
I guess he goes to the annual idiot convention.
Larry, Larry, Larry.
Better take a break, dude, you're APOPLECTIC.
P.S.
I know you haven't noticed, Larry, but YOU
have become a party zealot. Congratulations!
sarge, er..Rock, take your little brother larry outside for some fresh air, would you please?
GOOD CATCH!
Oh yea, fosdick will be at the annual idiot convention this year. He is the main speaker.
You know, they holding it in New Orleans at the "dome." There's a few MREs left for them and they all get to stay free in some at the FEMA trailer park. They all get a bus ride over to the dikes that Bush blew up. As a special door prize, one dozens "idiots" will get to break in the local Wal-Mart, and carry out everything they can put in a shopping cart.
The downside of the "idiot" convention is that they all have to pay for their own way there. But they all get a free ride home on buses...
Hey look everyone... gmager is here. He must have crawled out of the "Birdie" cage.
Some say that "gmager" and the "Bird" are one of the same and they have a Jekyll and Hyde type relationship and eat sandwiches made out of crap.
But I don't believe one word of it, because I know the "Bird" does not like bread...
Reid will win after all the little republicans pick each other to pieces in the primary.
Chuck Muth already backs Gibbons (10%) for the Republican Governor's race over Sandopeval, who Muth says won't sign the "no more taxes pledge."
Oh also, Brian Sandoval is getting a lot of favorable mention on Maldef's website. I wonder how the birthers, birchers, bigots and brainwashed Palinites will deal with that?
mred pukes: "I wonder how the birthers, birchers, bigots and brainwashed Palinites will deal with that?"
I will tell you mred, how the birthers, birchers, bigots and brainwashed Palinites will deal with that." They will vote with their money, and put those who don't listen to them, OUT TO PASTURE!!!
LarryVegas said...
"......for your information, Texas is doing well and a lot of retirees are moving there to get away from people that think like you. Have you ever heard of state rights???"
Hmmmmmm......states' rights....states' rights? Now I remember! That was one of the reasons we fought the Civil War, wasn't it? Darn, I made the same mistake again.
I said "Civil War" and not the "Northern War of Aggression." Shame on me! The next thing out of my mouth (god forbid...) will be a statement saying that the North won the war and ended all talk of "states' rights."
Maybe I am wrong, but somewhere I read, that "State's Rights" is a balance of federal powers and those powers held by the states as defined in the Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Constitution.
mred: why are you and your fellow lefties so afraid of Brian Sandoval? Is he a traitor to your ideals because he thinks for himself and doesn't believe in the credo that minorities must be femocrats?
The Sun - and other liberals here - make the point as no conservative could. Whenever Obama's shortcomings are brought up, we hear the "Bush did it" chanting.
So the Hope and Change thing was all a big lie. Wasn't this administration supposed to be vastly different? The argument that Obama can sell us down the river because Bush did it only makes Obama look worse.
Face it, you elected George W. Obama. Maybe you prefer Barack W. Bush.
Good one Larry... I like Larry's way of talking...
Comment removed by moderator. Comment was part of a personal disagreement and off topic.
Where do I send flowers to for the Thumper and gmager???