'Un-American' health-care debate

The "ugly campaign" to disrupt congressional forums on health-care reform is "simply un-American," said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer in USA Today. Members of Congress need to talk facts with their constituents so we can pass overdue health-insurance reform—which most Americans favor. It's fine for opponents of reform to speak their minds, but it's not OK for them to try to drown out those who disagree with them.

What hypocrisy, said Jonah Goldberg in National Review. Nancy Pelosi doesn't call disruptive liberal groups, such as Code Pink, "un-American." The Democratic leaders are only upset because they failed to squelch debate and get "their partisan version of health-care reform" approved before the August recess.

It's one thing to disagree with "the more sensational of the town hall protesters' tactics," said Doug Mataconis in Below the Beltway. "I’ve denounced those like Sarah Palin, Newt Gingrich," and others who have decided that the way to fight reform "is to lie about it." But Nancy Pelosi and Steny Hoyer should be ashamed of themselves for calling their opponents "un-American" and comparing them to Nazis —they're just exercising their "precious Constitutional right" to speak out.

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