Is this man fearless, or what? There's a bit of backstory to this, which I'll get into, but for now I'll let Talking Points Memo set the scene:
Rep. Alan Grayson (D-FL) paid a visit to an audience that wouldn't be a natural venue for a fiery liberal such as himself: A meeting of the local Orange County Republican Executive Committee.
Video of the encounter below.
From there we move to the Orlando Sentinel for a more thorough account:
U.S. Rep Alan Grayson, D-Orlando, walked in on an Orange County Republican Executive Committee meeting Thursday night at a Perkins restaurant and got into a confrontation with county mayoral candidate Matthew Falconer, a tense face-off caught by a couple cell phone cameras.
Before we get to the reason for Grayson's party crashing, we should note that there's a bit of history between him and the Orange County (FL) Republicans. It seems he recently had the following to say about GOP Orange County Chairman Lew Oliver:
"Oliver couldn’t find his rear end with both hands, unless there was a twenty-dollar bill sticking out of it."
Representative Grayson really needs to break out of his shell, and learn how to assert himself.
Anyway, on to what pissed him off enough to crash their party:
In the video, Grayson reads from a flier that describes a recent Republican infiltration of a pro-Obama group, and a promise to dish those details at this next GOP meeting. Grayson chides the Republican attendees for sinking so low as to spy on the other side.
Here's the brief video, apologies for the lopsided aspect. Apparently the confrontation was only shot with cellphones, and this was the best of the bunch:
Can you imagine if every Democrat had this kind of gumption? Not to mention a sense of humor and an instinct for soundbites ("couldn’t find his rear end with both hands, unless there was a twenty-dollar bill sticking out of it") that should be the envy of his colleagues.
He finishes with another hard slap:
"I gave them a chance to explain how they felt about it, and they didn’t do a very good job," Grayson said today. "The Republican Party is resorting to its Nixonian roots: corruption, lying and spying."
More Democrats like this, please.
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I love this man. More from My Fox Orlando:
"Take a walk," Grayson says to Falconer in the video. "You'll be lucky to get 5 percent of the vote my friend," he adds. Falconer demanded Grayson apologize for comments made about Oliver.
"I think it's disturbing to know that the Republican Party, locally, has sunk so low," Grayson told FOX 35 on Friday. "It's mired in corruption. They can't account for $10,000 in contributions that seems to have gone in the chairman's pocket, and now, they're resorting to lying and spying."
I don't think he has to apologize for anything. But that's just my opinion.