Well now, -this- is a step in the right direction. Props to Drunky McWhitebread for apologizing and admitting his error.

From CNN: No sidestepping, no obfuscation, no complaints of his status or the like, just; "I had a long day, I over-reacted, I was an ass and I'm sorry. No excuse, Sir."

My day just got a little better.

What to do with all that righteous indignation now?...

Save it for a less classy Congresscritter. This one seems to be something of a Mensch at least. I would never have expected such a direct, no-nonsense apology from a politician.

Stay vigilant, Dunedan; someone is bound to disappoint you sooner or later.

With politicians, the disappointment is so continuous that it takes someone of the calibre of, say, Edwin Edwards to truly elevate my opinion. Fast Eddie was corrupt, easily purchased, and prone to spending other people's money on his mistresses. But he was also honest, forthright, and a lot of fun to watch. That's the "best" I ever expect to see from a pol: honest corruption and good entertainment. The only exceptions I've seen have been Dennis Kucinich and Dr. Paul. I gave up on honest government and non-whingey politicians a LONG time ago.

http://www.intriguing.com/mp/_pictur...lyGrail007.jpg
Now we see the violence inherent in the system.

/ Couldn't help it.

CONTEXT ALERT!

The "student" in the video is an Andrew Breitbart's plants. You may remember Andrew Breitbart as the main force behind the totally dishonest smear campaign against ACORN.

In other words, we're almost certainly seeing a heavily edited clip without the context necessary to understand what's going on.
Source

Short of checking his prostate, what justification did Drunky McWhitebread have for assault, again? I'm all sorts of confused.

I grew up in a pussy world where grown men couldn't just wrassle each other over harsh language and a differing opinion.

*hides those damned dueling pistols*

I don't give a shit if the kid said he was a puppy peepee-sucking commie, it doesn't justify any physical contact.

Even the in-yo-face-with-the-gizmo and annoying reporter talk doesn't warrant that kind of legal bad touch.

...

This is totally mamby-pampy assault of course... as Americans we're guaranteed to see hotter action on Maury.

Honestly, if I was a judge? I'd let it slide for both idiots. My ruling would be: "Stop being total choads, mmkay?"

Tagging this thead as "OP = Utter Fail" is a bit of a dick move, regardless of where you stand on the issue. Just my 2 cents.

Yeah, I saw that. I don't know if Dunedan did it (good humor) or Jazz did (clever dickhead). Either way, I think it's hilarious.

I in fact did not see that, and I cannot see it reproduced now.

I must therefore assume that either the "tag" has been altered in such a way that I am unable to see it, or that the person responsible for the edit has changed it back.

In either case, the person responsible has made these changes without my consent and with nothing like a good God-damned reason. Whoever is responsible is indeed a dickhead, and I have made the appropriate complaints.

Whoever you are: This is bullshit. You can disagree with the premise of the thread all you like, or with my interpretation of the evidence, or with my presentation thereof. This, however, is crossing a pretty big line. Fuck off, jackass.

Indeed.

http://i919.photobucket.com/albums/a...sin/wtftfp.jpg

Aah, there it is. Thank you. I remain a Child Of The Early 90s (we still had film-strips and records in school) and sometimes miss things. I thought something untoward had been done with the subject line, or something of that sort. My objections stand, however; albeit in modified form.

Edited To Add: Upon further examination (with help) it would seem that this function is open, albeit indelible. I had been unaware of such a thing. This bears more thorough investigation. Apparently this board OS allows one to do all sorts of ridiculous things.

Before you lemmings form a giant pile of righteous outrage at the bottom of the cliff, I didn't alter the tags either time. I'll admit to laughing, though.

Lemmings? Please... we're more like Republicans blaming Obama for X.

...

And I think everybody was laughing until they realized Dunedan didn't do it.

I'm usually the only idjit 'round these parts that does stupid shit with tags.

I got a question, when was it reported that this guy was drunk? There was no article attached to the OP or anything other than the video to tell us this. I can't find anything on the net saying anything about drinking.

I'm starting to agree with WR. Seeing where the video comes from is making me wonder about the whole story.

Anybody else see the irony in Eden questioning the state of inebriation of another from North Carolina?

...

Yeah, the video is totally suspect. Just like every other political video posted on here.

You look at it... form an opinion. Then you look at it again and see how it's edited for spin.

"Bloodthirsty" Apache chopper pilots vaping those "innocent" photographers, anyone?

It's difficult to say. It's difficult to know whether a drunk man would sooner punch someone in the face or slap on a nasty hug attack. I just don't know....

His speech did seem a bit slurred when he first started speaking.

---

-+-{Important TFP Staff Message}-+- The ability to edit other people's tags was something that I left open for people to help better define the topics, help out the community and good general welfare. Alas it always takes one moron to ruin it for everyone. I have removed that ability from all groups except for staff. I have extremely good chances of finding out who did it (we track EVERYTHING here) I don't take to kindly to those kinds of sophomoric escapades. I don't tolerate it from staff members and have removed such staffers, and I won't tolerate it from members. In the future, you should direct such kinds of complaints to the Admins, we have 4 extremely active ones, cynthetiq, The_Jazz, amonkie, and SecretMethod70.

Jesus, I wrote the tag.

One way or another, this thread is gonna result in a witch hunt, amirite?

No, it won't. It wasn't overly cool of you, but no harm done. We don't have rules to govern this sort of thing, but the tag editing feature is turned off for now. The day a rule goes up banning bad jokes is the day the countdown clock for said banning starts on yours truly. Over/under is 2 days.

the fact that this thread has devolved into an argument about tags says everything

I admit to not reading all this thread because some of it seemed to be truly and unnecessarily harsh on Dunedin, for expressing his opinion.

First, I understand exactly where he is coming from. This could be considered state violence against the people. Rep Drunk Fuck probably would never have laid hands on the kid if he didn't have Rep before his name and the protection that comes with it.

Does that mean that we are oppressed? No, but it shows these congress fucks believe they can get away with anything they fucking want to. And that is wrong. ANY congress person that lays hands on a civilian like this should be asked for his resignation or at the very least tried for more than just assault because this is an abuse of power.

Secondly, had the kid reporter been black, Hispanic or female, this would probably have been headline news until Rep. Dunk Fuck resigned. The fact it was a white male student and someone has posted it was a set up... says something about the reverse racism and ignorance of some people. Rep. Drunk Fuck should be asked for his resignation REGARDLESS of whom, what race, what nationality, what whatever the kids is. The same could also be said based on party affiliation... Dem it's ok... GOP turn in your resignation type press.

To imply that someone from Congress was set up to do this is flat out ludicrous and trying to find reason to find an excuse for his behavior. I did not see anyone trying to lay hands on the Rep. I did not see any provocation and if having a microphone and being taped is provocation to Rep. Drunk Fuck.... then why hasn't he done it to CNN, ABC, etc reporters? Being a congress person means having cameras and mics in your face at any given time. The fact is he laid hands and intended harm to someone and did so knowing that as a Dem Representative he would get off and nothing would happen to him.

I missed you Pan. Glad to have you back. I believe you should expect replies. :)

Does it matter if he was drunk or not?

Well, in a way I think it does. If he did this sober it is an even worse showing of his abuse of power and what he knows he can get away with.

Pan, I'm not going to bother responding until you can be bothered to read the whole thread. Especially since you've clearly got no clue about the information revealed as it developed.

Dude, it gets better.

Speculation.

Actually, I don't think it does. If he believed he could have gotten away with anything, he would have at the very least taken their cameras, don't you think?

I'm not sure about this. While I will admit that his resignation should be considered, I don't think it should be based on the accusation of an abuse of power. Rather, I think it's a breach of trust and integrity. His position is a senior one in a legislative capacity. If he demonstrates an inability to abide by the law of the land, then the trust the people place in him is in question. But where do we draw the line on this?

I'm not at all interested in what-ifs. They're useless and unwieldy. Because we would need to go further and say, "Had the Congressman been Black or Hispanic, he would have been forced to resign already.... Had the Congressman been female, the actions would have been ridiculed.... Had this been at night, the Congressman's actions would have been justified as self-defense...." Also, I don't know how the suggestion that it was a setup is reverse racism. Generally, you're really stretching here—really stretching....

Hole. Lee. Shit.

The stupidity, it is blinding.

Apologies. There isn't any real discussion happening in this thread anyway, other than crazy gibberish, so I leave it to you more brave souls.

State violence against the people....now, thats just bizarre.

While not condoning at all the thuggish actions of the congressman, IMO, part of the problem is these new "journalists" who are not out to seek or report on the facts, but to ambush the "enemy"

Perhaps when they display even minimal levels of journalistic standards and ethics, such responses might not occur.

I agree with you. We've delved into paparazzi journalism. Ideally, this guy would have scheduled an appointment and sat down with the Congressman. I don't know how realistic that is, however. Do congressman sit down with the blogger side of the media? Do you have to be AP to get consideration? Perhaps, some do and some don't.

One sees a lot of this in the ambush documentaries of the day as well. Michael Moore comes to mind first, but certainly it happens on all sides of all issues. They aren't even documentaries, when you think about it. The situations are so contrived as not to document events but to "create" events to film.

just for the record, I am not singling out the conservative ambushers.

I agree, Michael Moore started it all.

It doesn't have to come to scheduling an appointment. I think members of Congress are leery of anyone purporting to be a journalist, but not displaying any credentials or identification. You can see the AP or CBS or FOX guys coming; they all wear their IDs.

You speak with a blogger...they edit it...you have no recourse, unlike speaking with a reputable media person (even FOX!)...well maybe not O'Reilly and his ambushers.

actually, I'd argue that someone who has a tendency toward assault would be doing it regardless of his job description

Exactly, I've seen people do worse then what he did for much less and they certainly didn't have Rep before their names. Sometimes people are just giant assholes regardless of their stature or title, I doubt he pulled this stunt because of his position its probably just his nature. Although I have to say calling this "assault" comes off as slightly ludicrous in my opinion, sure it probably is by the letter of the law...but c'mon it looked like a slap fight between two 10 year old girls.

On a side note did anybody crack up when he put his arm around the kid at the end? It was such a picture perfect belligerent drunk moment.

I can see that as a possibility or the possibility that because of the title and entitlements that come with it he has an overblown ego and belief he can get away with such things.

If he was committing murder, embezzling funds, getting his kid out trouble when he is driving around with 10 kilos of coke, or taking handouts from lobbyists, I could see you being right pan. This incident? Take away the suits/ties and it looks like an old redneck trying to push around some young kids that were bothering him. An asshole is going to be an asshole no matter what title he has in front of behind his name.

For there to be a question of impeachment or any judicial action, the "student" has to press charges. I don't condone what he done (he shouldn't have grabbed the kid), but this seems like this got blew up to massive bullshit proportions. I can't wait to see the kid on TV with his arm in cast/sling talking about his physical pain and emotional trauma.

so you're advocating that journalists should be licensed and authorized?

I think you may be putting words in his mouth...er...keyboard. I think he's simply acknowledging there's a problem present in this new world of information sharing. Everyone now has a platform to easily share information and because of that they may feel they have a right to...detain...anyone and demand answers. Imagine if anyone who wants to feels they can stop you on the street and ask you a question to be published to the world and there is some sort of expectation by the "reporter" that you MUST stop and answer their questions until they are satisfied. What if you have tickets to a show, or it's your son's birthday? There is a life after work, you know.

We all need to acknowledge there's been a change in how information is collected and that the line is now blurry on protocols in collecting that information. Now, I will be the first to say that our nation's congress are slaves to their master, the people. However, there has to be a limit to when their day ends and they simply become a working man who's going home to hug his wife and watch a little TV.

I don't have any answers. It's events like this which will more strongly define the new protocol. Hopefully, that protocol will never condone assault of the "reporter".