In case you missed it yesterday, here's Rep. Tim Ryan, responding to the verbal attacks on his colleagues yesterday by the Tea Partiers, and calling on his Republican colleagues who participated in the rally to denounce those attacks.
That's unlikely to happen, as the Republicans seem just fine with these kinds of tactics. Take what happened earlier today in the House chamber. Jon Cohn was there:
Moments ago, while members were on the floor for a vote, a protester stood up in the visitor's gallery and began shouting "Kill the bill! Kill the bill! Kill the bill!" Clerks quickly removed him. But as they were doing so, a number of Republicans--at least a dozen, from what I could see from a few feet away--were cheering the man.
Representative Barney Frank, who was the target of yesterday's homophobic epithets, told reporters he was "appalled" and that he felt the Republicans "were encouraging him to resist. ... I've never seen members of the House cheering on a guy resisting being kicked out of the gallery. It's a dangerous situation and the Republicans are cheering him on."
Frank says he approached one of his Republican colleagues--I think he said it was Missouri's Roy Blunt--and told them his caucus should not be stoking this kind of emotion. Blunt apparently replied by saying he wasn't one of the Republicans cheering.
Meanwhile, conservative activists are staging a rally on the North lawn, which is right outside the House chamber. A trio of Republicans went to the House balcony and started waving hand-made signs saying "Kill...the...bill" as the crowd chanted. As a colleague of mine remarked, that scene was more farcical than scary--like a scene out of Evita.
They're apparently reflecting their base, if conservative bloggers are reflective:
I expected some conservatives to deny that Congressman John Lewis, a hero of the civli rights movement was called [the N word] by opponents of health care reform, and to deny that another African American member of Congress, Emanuel Cleaver, was spat on. But I'll confess to some surprise that Althouse would stipulate to those actions, but dismiss them with a simple "so what?"
UPDATE: "Instapundit" Glenn Reynolds wants an apology from Rep. James Clyburn. Why? Because Clyburn said of yesterday's protests, "I have heard things today that I have not heard since March 15, 1960, when I was marching to get off the back of the bus." Unclear whether Reynolds thinks Clyburn should apologize to the people who hurled epithets at Lewis and Barney Frank, or to the person who spit on Cleaver.
Yep, that's the "loyal opposition," folks.
And speaking of which, Stupak is still a no, with Dems saying they're at 214.
Update: Maybe why there isn't a Stupak deal, yet.
Asked if the White House is proposing to make the Hyde Amendment permanent in order to secure Rep. Bart Stupak's vote, Rep. Diana DeGette, leader of the pro-choice caucus, says that if they were, she would oppose it. But she didn't see such a provision in the White House's draft of the executive order language.
Need to flip some nos, I think. Arcuri, Lynch, Altmire, who else? That's who labor is focusing on.