It's Florida 2000 all over again
Remember the thugs who disrupted the recount vote in the Florida 2000 Presidential election by banging on the glass doors. Similar thuggery is now being used to disrupt health care meetings. See TPM's report and video on Sen. Specter's meeting in Philadelphia.
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/08/teabaggers-try-to-shout-down-health-care-reform-at-town-halls.php?ref=fpa
Remember bullying worked for the right wing in Florida 2000. No matter what your position is on health care reform bullying is not the way to make your point.
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Tell that to Black Panther thugs who "patrolled" an election site in Philly last November, intimidated a well-known civil rights lawyer, and got the lawsuit dismissed by Eric Holder.
I think they would disagree with you that bullying is not the way to make a point.
August 3, 2009 4:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
Lalo, you're smarter than some of the things you say, you know?
http://tpmelectioncentral.talkingpointsmemo.com/2008/11/obama_volunteer_on_scene_dispu.php
August 3, 2009 5:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
Justice Dept filed a suit against 3 Black Panther "activists". The Government won it by default because none of them showed up in court. Eric Holder dismissed the suit against 2 of them. But he kept it for 1.
Greg Sargent carries water for Obama. But even then, quoting Sargent quoting an Obama volunteer carries a little less weight than the action of the Justice Dept.
Don't you think?
August 3, 2009 5:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
got a link for those claims?
August 3, 2009 6:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
If Obama was a Republican, he might have nominated a voter intimidating Black Panther to the SCOTUS.
Voter intimidation in Phoenix in the 1960's is how former Chief Justice Rehnquist got his stamp of approval from the right.
Holder also dismissed the case against Stevens in Alaska, and his DOJ hasn't ginned up any new rationales for trashing the Constitution.
August 3, 2009 6:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
..but Lalo, why care about what 3 Blacks did in Philly last election day, is that the worst offense you've witnessed in this country the last eight years, white boy?
August 3, 2009 6:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
I don't, but the post is about "thuggery" and bullying so I'm perfectly on topic.
August 3, 2009 7:03 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'm not sure, Lalo. But I'm not going to hijack the topic of someone else's post by reaching into the air and pulling down some random false equivalency with this Blank Panthers thing.
Deference goes to Tlees2. This is about health care. At some point, the opposition party might want to bring something other than disrupt, demonize and delay tactics to reasoned debate.
August 3, 2009 7:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
Nice try at diversionary tactics.
August 3, 2009 7:30 PM | Reply | Permalink
Here is a link to the complaint, motions and default judgment in the case.
None of the documents discuss why two of them were dismissed, but the one they kept is the guy with the nightstick.
Who was the civil rights lawyer that was intimidated? There is no mention of that incident in the documents.
However, this case is no Florida 2000 (says a So. Floridian).
August 3, 2009 7:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
thanks seashell, fine work:)
August 3, 2009 8:02 PM | Reply | Permalink
Bartle Bull, apparently a former aid to RFK.
"In all my experience in politics, in civil rights litigation and in my efforts in the 1960s to secure the right to vote in Mississippi ... I have never encountered or heard of another instance in the United States where armed and uniformed men blocked the entrance to a polling location."
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/may/29/career-lawyers-overruled-on-voting-case/?feat=home_cube_position1&
August 3, 2009 10:08 PM | Reply | Permalink
You realize the "Black Panthers" don't even exist any more, right? Haven't for decades.
Former members did have a reuion back in 2004 - but that hardly counts.
August 3, 2009 8:02 PM | Reply | Permalink
LaLo
What message do you think they are trying to send with by sending out the 'Bully Brigade' and using these tactics?
Thanks.
August 3, 2009 8:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
The message is always the same.
"Look at me! I'm Lalo, and I can ruin any thread I want to! Oh, and the fact that you are inured to my Lincoln/Obama avatar makes me feel really safe."
August 3, 2009 8:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hi CV!
I've been considering their goal. What they are doing reminds me of high school and/or all about deflection when confronted with an issue one has no intelligent, factual responsive comeback! Juvenile Bully Brigade tactics.
That said, I've now been reading that in some it is rapidly degenerating into shades of the crap that was spewed at Palin rallies. And I find that scary.
What's your take?
August 3, 2009 8:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
Bingo! The point is to shift focus away from the fact that the teabaggers are trying to do all across the country what they did in Philadelphia. This is the future of our health care that these people are messing with. That little intimidation escapade in Florida can be linked in a direct line to our war of choice in Iraq. We need to fight back forcefully.
August 3, 2009 8:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
Awwww, my bad!
You probably waded in here anxious and eager for yet another Bush trash-fest, what with Florida 2000, etc.
Sorry to have rained on your parade.
But not to worry, there's a GOP/Bush/Palin/-/ trash-fest every few posts, you'll get that great high back in no time and won't even feel any withdrawal symptoms.
August 3, 2009 10:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
The same message Democrats were sending back in 2005 during the Social Security town halls.
It's called media noise.
Why are you acting like anything you're seeing has never happened before? Why are you acting like you belong to a party of Saints?
You don't. Republicans have mistresses and 13 Democrats are currently under corruption investigation.
Wake up, honey. Both parties play hardball and dirty politics.
August 3, 2009 10:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
See Josh Marshall's 10:17 PM comment at TPM.
August 3, 2009 10:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
Josh Marshall has the right to his own opinion as much as I have the right to my own. And so does Marc Ambinder, to whose post Josh Marshall is reacting.
August 3, 2009 10:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
Sure you do, but to try to change the topic when health care is such an important issue is unjustified in my opinion which I have a right to. Meanwhile, as you worry about the Black Panthers another health care meeting in Wisconsin has been disrupted by shouting. This either doesn't bother you, or you are in favor of it. Since, you are all for the right to everyone's opinion there's a real inconsistency there.
August 4, 2009 5:29 AM | Reply | Permalink
Oh, I think he's in favor of the shouting; that is essentially what he does here in his untiring efforts to ruin every thread about health care reform.
August 4, 2009 9:25 AM | Reply | Permalink
Check out this Daily Kos post about progressive Dems successfully countering tea-bagging shouters at a townhall event:
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/8/4/761608/-Tea-Baggers-FAIL-to-disrupt-Health-Care-meeting,-lessons-shared.
August 4, 2009 2:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
Paul Krugman and Robert Gibbs are thinking the same way I am.
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/04/a-moveable-mob/
August 4, 2009 3:31 PM | Reply | Permalink