“You lie!”
So, if you don’t know yet, I write “Current Events” blogs for a little news site called “EverydayChristian“. I wrote this, but another blogger beat me to the same topic. However, I worked too hard on it to let it go to waste, so here you go:
By now, I’m sure everyone has heard audio or read about Rep. Joe Wilson, R-S.C., who hollered “You lie!”at the President during his speech on health care reform.
It sounds like something that would happen in the House of Commons, where loud-mouth behavior and interruptions are business-as-usual. But in America, such behavior is disrespectful to the office of public servant and to the constituents who trust Representatives to “represent” our interests, not merely heckle from the sidelines, and reduce intelligent debate to school-yard name-calling.
I’m saddened that our politics have disintegrated to this level. Wilson himself said in a written statement: “This evening I let my emotions get the best of me when listening to the president’s remarks regarding the coverage of illegal immigrants in the health care bill.. ..While I disagree with the president’s statement, my comments were inappropriate and regrettable. I extend sincere apologies to the president for this lack of civility.”
OK. So he understands that his behavior was inappropriate, and has received a fairly substantial backlash from both sides of the political aisle. But why was he so upset? It is fair to assume that someone who has no record of being indiscreet might have gotten unruly out of honest frustration with dishonest policy?
It seems that while President Obama’s statements regarding illegal aliens may be true on the surface, with a bit of background it appears that they are deceiving. The Congressional Research Service agrees with this assessment ( full report found here). For example, with regard to health care exchanges, the CRS found: “H.R. 3200 does not contain any restrictions on noncitizens—whether legally or illegally present, or in the United States temporarily or permanently—participating in the Exchange.”
Just as with the subsidized abortion debate, not writing legislation against insuring illegal aliens is a back-door way of including them in America’s ever-rising costs. CRS also found that Section 246, which could prevent illegal aliens from participating in the government (public) option, would be: “hard to enforce.”
The Examiner points out that: “Section 246 (page 143) of the bill expressly prohibits illegal aliens from receiving government-run healthcare, the bill does not include a specific requirement that a person prove his or her citizenship in order to obtain affordability credits, which means that illegal aliens could obtain coverage.” Hard to enforce, indeed.
On top of the absence of good legislation to work through the illegal immigration problem, there are many voices who fear that a complete amnesty bill will follow shortly after Health Care Reform, should it pass. NewsMax.com: “[Obama’s] remedy, seemingly, would be to document all immigrants by way of a comprehensive pathway to citizenship bill, quick on the heels of a universal healthcare bill. By waving the amnesty wand, he would resolve all questions regarding the eligibility of illegal aliens, thus transforming perhaps 30 million persons of all ages into U.S. citizens eligible for healthcare at taxpayer expense.”
It’s natural to feel a bit peeved at such glaring omissions. Perhaps we can sympathize with Representative Wilson’s rash remarks, and we wish that our President would have been more forthcoming in his speech. But we, as Christians, are called to a higher standard. We have to find ways to speak the truth without heckling or name-calling. Whatever Wilson believes, he hurt his cause by speaking his mind in an inappropriate way. We need to take a lesson from his mistakes, and keep our angry hollerings to ourselves.
I guess the Lord knows that we people have a problem with speaking the truth without anger, which is why we have this wisdom in Ephesians 4:25-27: “Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to his neighbor, for we are all members of one body. ‘In your anger do not sin’ Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold.”
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