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http://www.thebluebanner.net/tea-party-protesters-cross-line-on-capitol-hill-1.1278938

The Blue Banner

Tea Party protesters cross line on Capitol Hill
By
Published: Wednesday, March 24, 2010
Updated: Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Hopefully now that the debate over health care reform is winding down, some small semblance of respect and civility can return to the American political process.

The chances of that happening completely are slim, but the least we can hope for is a dissolving of the racist imagery and hurtful and inappropriate words the Tea Party used in the anti-government/anti-health care protests last summer will cease to exist.

While it is great that Americans have the right to free speech, there are times when the idea of free speech gets distorted into something it is not.

Last Saturday’s protests on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C. on the eve of the health care vote in the U.S. House exemplify this distortion vividly.

So long as those anti-health care protestors had the correct permits to protest outside the Capitol, which they seemingly did, they had every right to be there and to let their voices be heard.

What was not part of the permit they received from the city was the right to spit on members of Congress, yell racial epithets at them, call them “faggots” or physically push them as they passed by the protestors.

According to accounts from various news organizations, Capitol Hill staffers and members of Congress, all of those things happened.

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Calling your president a socialist, fascist, communist, anti-American, Muslim-terrorist and Kenyan-Nazi is really nothing of which to be proud. Bringing guns to protests, yelling racial and homosexual slurs at members of Congress, and then spitting on and pushing our elected officials is nothing to go around celebrating about either.

In some parts of the media and in certain political circles, these protestors continue to be touted as some sort of “freedom-loving patriots.”

This needs to stop and they need to be called what they really are: ignorant, pathetic and embarrassing.

There is simply no place for these kinds of actions and behaviors in a civilized society.

Even in protests, a line needs to be drawn, and in the case of these most recent anti-health care reform protests, that line has been crossed and this nation is worse off for it.

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