Nov 7th, 2009 at 4:38 pm
GOP Members Shout Down Women Members of Congress
I spent the day at the zoo rather than watching C-SPAN. And obviously the action is still happening. But this is pretty remarkable. The Democratic Women’s Caucus had a series of speakers lined up to talk in favor of the health care bill, and Republicans decided to shut them up by talking over them, endlessly interrupting with spurious parliamentary inquiries:
It’s bizarre behavior. I’m not one to put a ton of stock in the idea that civility is the be-all and end-all of politics, but this kind of thing is really nuts and I think only serves to underscore how hollow complains of insufficient bipartisanship are.
42 Responses to “GOP Members Shout Down Women Members of Congress”
Register
RSSLogin
Advertisement
Visit Our Affiliated Sites
Books By Matthew Yglesias
Topic CloudView topics sorted by popularity
Abortion
Afghanistan
Basketball
Blanche Lincoln
Budget
China
climate
Congress
Crime
DC
Demographics
Economics
Economy
Energy
Environment
EU
Finance
Football
Gender
Health Care
History
Inequality
International Law
International Relations
Iran
Israel
Media
Monetary Policy
National Security
NATO
NBA
Palestine
Political Reform
Public Health
Public Opinion
Race
Regulation
Russia
Sarah Palin
Sports
Stimulus
taxes
Technology
Trade
transportation
Featured
Subscribe to the Progress Report
Contact Matthew Yglesias
Use this form to contact blog author Matthew Yglesias.
ArchivesBlog RollAbout Matt YglesiasContact Me
Donate
November 7th, 2009 at 4:42 pm
But they were asking for it, opening their fool mouths like they did.
November 7th, 2009 at 4:43 pm
Can’t wait to read Dean Broder’s next sorrowful column denouncing those Republicans for puerile, partisan tactics that undermine the sober, respectful, bipartisan consensus that Real, Rural Americans desire . . .
[crickets]
November 7th, 2009 at 4:46 pm
C’mon, Matt, you know the rules by now. Being obnoxiously disruptive is A-OK if you’re putting a stupid b*tch in her place.
(If the topic under discussion is “killing brown people” or “making sure that none of our precious Amurkan tax dollars end up in the hands of a n*gger,” well, those are serious, serious policy decisions and anyone who dares mock them is an Unserious D*rty F*cking Hippie Librul.)
November 7th, 2009 at 4:49 pm
I’m not one to put a ton of stock in the idea that civility is the be-all and end-all of politics
Huh? You absolutely hate the idea of civility in politics. Look at your lauding of Alan Grayson’s incivility.
November 7th, 2009 at 4:53 pm
Look at your lauding of Alan Grayson’s incivility.
OK, Al, I’ll bite: what specific action of Grayson’s are you alluding to here?
November 7th, 2009 at 5:01 pm
The Sergeant at Arms is there for a reason. Send the GOPpers to the Capitol daycare with the other screaming infants.
(Al’s sad decline to the bargain basement of trolling is much in evidence today.)
November 7th, 2009 at 5:09 pm
It’s bizarre behavior.
What? No. This is typical, normal behavior for Republicans. This is what they are rewarded for, and this is what their caucus selects for. It starts when they join the College Republicans, and the pattern continues through into their adulthood. They treat their friends and family the same way. How can you credibly call this “bizarre”?
November 7th, 2009 at 5:12 pm
I see that the Republicans at least did realize halfway through that it would look better if they scrounged up a woman to do the shouting over the other women.
November 7th, 2009 at 5:13 pm
I’m not one to put a ton of stock in the idea that civility is the be-all and end-all of politics
Huh? You absolutely hate the idea of civility in politics. Look at your lauding of Alan Grayson’s incivility.
Look, Al, I’m going to type this very s-l-o-w-l-y so even your dumb monkey ass can understand –
Grayson merely stated the obvious, much as I did when I called you a dumb monkey. Crude, yes.
If I were to DDoS your dumb monkey ass so you couldn’t put your stupid ass, but Constitutionally protected wrong opinions on Matt’s site, that would be wrong. Just like that dumb monkey ass GOP asshole used the parliamentary equivalent of a DDoS to drown out the Democratic Congresswoman from articulating a position that the vast majority of Americans agree with so that the dumb monkey ass GOP-er can make sure his best friends in the insurance industry could continue to profit from the deaths of Americans.
There, that’s a pretty easy explanation even your dumb monkey ass could maybe understand.
November 7th, 2009 at 5:14 pm
Nothing against John Dingell, but I would have loved to have seen Barney Frank in that position today. He would have told those assholes to go to hell.
November 7th, 2009 at 5:19 pm
I’m not sure, but aren’t they just asking for equal time for themselves? Was that the point of their objection?
November 7th, 2009 at 5:20 pm
“Look at your lauding of Alan Grayson’s incivility.”
Grayson said the truth and truth is sometimes not pretty. I cannot get insurance and the Republicans really have made it clear that they do not ever want me to get insurance. Without insurance, I will die, and that is precisely what the Republican Party wants. Say it’s over the top all you want, but given that the Republicans offered a plan that lets the insurance companies drop even more people and defines all standards as the lesser of what Guam and the Marianas Islands define them to be (none, and less than none), I fail to see how the Republican Party intends to do anything but kill me. Grayson is simply speaking the truth Al, and you should too. So tell me, Al, why do you want to kill me?
November 7th, 2009 at 5:21 pm
I’m not one to put a ton of stock in the idea that civility is the be-all and end-all of politics, but this kind of thing is really nuts and I think only serves to underscore how hollow complains of insufficient bipartisanship are.
This kind of think can’t be helping them, either, in their efforts to enlist conservative and moderate Democrats in the cause of stopping the legislation, can it? Any more than the utter nuttiness of the protesters they enlist in their cause helps them.
It seems to me one major, underlying theme of the past year’s political events has been GOP overreach (in opposition).
November 7th, 2009 at 5:28 pm
I spent the day at the zoo rather than watching C-SPAN.
You would’ve seen the same pack of howling monkeys either way.
November 7th, 2009 at 5:29 pm
The speakers were seeking unanimous — without a vote — consent to extend and revise their remarks. It’s a reare speech on the floor of the House that doesn’t contain such a request. It is always granted. It lets staff basically edit the transcript of your speech before it turns up in the Congressional Record.
Sheer bullying at worst. At best, sheer dilatoriness.
November 7th, 2009 at 5:37 pm
Well, Davis X, here’s how the NYT describes it:
http://prescriptions.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/11/07/house-debate-objections/ . As “a bit of theater that Democrats decided to put on”. And I suspect that’s probably what it was.
November 7th, 2009 at 6:16 pm
Let me search for about 3 nanoseconds for examples of lefty activists shouting down female conservative speakers.
Nah, no one on the progressive left would do anything like that…
November 7th, 2009 at 6:17 pm
Now that the Democrats have sacrificed Abortion, what do they really have left?
There is not one single issue where they will draw the line. Not one.
November 7th, 2009 at 6:22 pm
James, are you really so fucking stupid that you can’t tell the difference between shouting down a clown and making a mockery of Congressional duties?
November 7th, 2009 at 6:35 pm
grand old (tea) party
November 7th, 2009 at 6:44 pm
Yes, James Robertson is that stupid. He displays it here constantly.
abb1: the Democrats have nothing on the Republicans when it comes to theater. I’d say Shaddeg should be embarrassed for this disgrace, but Republicans lack the required shame.
November 7th, 2009 at 7:43 pm
I suspect there are a few women executives who had a distinct feeling of deja vu while watching that video.
Men talking over them rudely during a meeting? That never happens.
November 7th, 2009 at 7:47 pm
On the floor of Congress? While the women being shouted down had the floor?
James, I think you’re a moronic dickhead, and you just made that up. Now, when you post links to videos proving me wrong, boy am I going to look stupid.
Yep, I sure am going to look stupid when you post videos of similar behavior by Democrats on the floor of the House while Congress is in session.
Yep. Here’s your big chance to make me look like an idiot after all the times I’ve rubbed your nose in your idiocy.
So…I’ll check back in an hour to see how you’ve done.
November 7th, 2009 at 8:10 pm
In fairness to Mr. Robertson, liberals really shouldn’t shout down Ann Coulter. If she wants to make a fool of herself by talking, let her. She comes across as more intelligent when shoe doesn’t say a word. Conservatives do have a reason to shut liberal speakers down. Conservatives need to prevent any truth from being spoken.
November 7th, 2009 at 9:31 pm
[...] Then there was this, when the Congressional Women’s Caucus attempted to speak, only to be shouted down and talked over by a…: [...]
November 7th, 2009 at 10:44 pm
So, can someone tell me why someone
approved to speak by the house gavel
can be shouted down by the opposition?
I thought the House differed from the
Senate in this regard.
November 7th, 2009 at 11:19 pm
#18 – I don’t even care for Ann Coulter that much. But you know how it comes across when lefties shout her down? Amazingly like the example Matt points out here:
“We have no argument to counter you with; all we can do is plug our ears and yell”
November 7th, 2009 at 11:42 pm
Ann Coulter is a professional troll, which means that she gets paid to goad people. Last time I checked, she hadn’t been elected to anything, and J-Rob had yet to sashay his insular blinkeredness into a paying gig on the White Collar Comedy Tour.
November 8th, 2009 at 12:36 am
Oh, James Robertson, you are so brilliant. It’s a shame you don’t even follow your own link. The second item on the search you provided is one of David Horowitz being shouted down. That’s some sexism, right there! And, of course, it was probably mostly women heckling Coulter, what with her being against the right of women to vote.
Oh, and item three is a link to this very thread– I guess Ann Coulter hasn’t been shouted down all that much, eh?
November 8th, 2009 at 2:35 am
You know James, being an Internet troll, these false equivalence “look over there” distractions are pretty cute, but in real life this and your abject denial about the reality of the barbarism of the Republican fools that YOU vote foe makes you look like a fool.
These are the sort of people that you support who are trashing the House with their hatred on the floor. It is a sign that Republicans vote for a
and are attracted to crazed vile vessels of hate who cannot get over their resentment over Dems being in control.
November 8th, 2009 at 3:09 am
Lo, Finley Peter Dunne, pity that thoust ar’n't alive to see this day!
November 8th, 2009 at 3:57 am
I hate the Republicans just as much as the next guy. Nevertheless, let’s be fair here:
- it’s the Democrats who are bulling in this particular incident.
- the Republicans refuse to be bullied, in this particular incident.
- there is nothing sexist in interrupting women, at least in this incident. It’s using women to produce the reaction that the post (and most comments) manifest, that is certainly, well, if not sexist, then definitely sleazy. Shame on you, fellas.
November 8th, 2009 at 9:15 am
Davis X Machina has it right. abb1 points to an opinion piece in the Times which has it wrong. Since abb1 makes the mistake of referring to an opinion piece in the Times as the Times, he has it doubly wrong.
November 8th, 2009 at 9:41 am
Sure, I could be wrong. It seems odd, though, that they would choose to heckle this particular group of speakers, which suggests to me that something else was going on there.
November 8th, 2009 at 10:32 am
[...] C-Span broadcast of the House debate on a parliamentary motion to extend remarks on the House bill. According to Yglesias, sexist Republicans (including — although he fails to mention this — Republican women) [...]
November 8th, 2009 at 10:42 am
If I were mr price’s opponent in the primaries or general election, this would be my campaign ad. I’d follow this clip with a folksy voice saying, “ever wonder why government doesn’t work for ordinary people?”
November 8th, 2009 at 11:31 am
I hate the Republicans just as much as the next guy.
I doubt that very much.
November 8th, 2009 at 12:34 pm
US Congress.
The World’s Most Powerful Kindergarten.
Any debt when they’ll start fighting?
November 8th, 2009 at 2:29 pm
Friends don’t let friends vote Republican.
Republicans hate America.
November 9th, 2009 at 12:25 pm
Comes across to whom? Some of the people on that college campus? People who are already such committed movement conservatives that they read David Horowitz?
When Republican Congressmen behave like this – interrupting the President during an address to a joint session of Congress by shouting “You lie!” for example – it “comes across” that way to a whole lot more people.
I’m glad my party doesn’t nominate people who behave like that to positions of prominence.
November 10th, 2009 at 11:24 pm
[...] heckling them and shouting “I object, I object, I object, I object” over them. Think Progress has the video. Thrown under the bus by their own party, some of the women we voted into office were forced to [...]
November 14th, 2009 at 3:25 pm
[...] The speakers were seeking unanimous — without a vote — consent to extend and revise their remarks. It’s a reare speech on the floor of the House that doesn’t contain such a request. It is always granted. It lets staff basically edit the …This Blog [...]