Last updated on August 10th, 2014 at 05:08 pm
At a town hall protest in San Diego over the weekend a town hall protester tried to say that healthcare reform is unconstitutional, but it didn’t quite come out that way. He said, “I got a book here called the U.S.S. Constitution.” Ahoy, matey, the U.S.S. Constitution may not give the government authority to reform healthcare, but the U.S. Constitution does.
Here is the video courtesy of Think Progress:
The U.S.S. Constitution scholar said, “Everybody’s seen this before. And you know what? I’ve this book three times now, and I’ve referenced it dozens of times and I can’t find one little paragraph in here that says the government has the right to take over our health care.”
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Look, this is the Sarah Palin/Michele Bachmann rule. If you are going to quote talking points in front of a television camera, you better get them right or else you are going to look like a moron. Other protests said that God will take care of healthcare, and Obama’s church was based on racism. One guy was babbling about toilet paper in Cuba. This was a total fringe freak show.
I don’t know why any politician is worried about these protesters. The vast majority of them have no clue what they are protesting. What they have in common is that they are old, white, and angry about the election of Barack Obama. These people may have read the Constitution, but I doubt that they actually know what is in it.
The federal government has the legal authority to reform healthcare, and that is what they are going to do. I wonder what is going to happen to these angry people after healthcare passes. Are they going lock themselves in their houses and commiserate with the warm television glow of Glenn Beck, or will they attach to another fringe cause?
Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.
Awards and Professional Memberships
Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association
