In the New Hampshire legislature today, Republican State Representative Steve Vaillancourt was tossed from the chamber for shouting "Sieg Heil" and waving -- or not waving -- his hand in a Nazi salute. Vaillancourt was objecting to limitations on debate over a voter ID bill.
The chamber then formed an apology committee to help him regret his mistake. From the local Concord Patch:
"As I was saying before, I cannot apologize for anything I did not do," Vaillancourt said. "But I do apologize for using two German words, which I understand has negative ramifications when three Latin words would have been better. I will never use a German word again."
As Vaillancourt received a smattering of applause and returned to his seat, the committee huddled with O'Brien and determined that the apology wasn't acceptable.
Vaillancourt did eventually offer up an apology that worked. It mentioned "inflammatory German words which can have offensive connotation," according to a report tweeted by Republican State Representative Jon Richardson.
In other New Hampshire news, House Republicans brought back legislation for a 24-hour waiting period for women seeking an abortion. Today, the chamber also revived a measure that would allow religious institutions not to offer insurance coverage for contraception. You can find that one here, attached to a bill about delegates for a constitutional convention -- search for "2012-2215h."
(Image: The apology committee meets with Representative Vaillancourt, in white shirt. Pic tweeted by Representative Richardson.)
UPDATE: James Carter did the good deed of going through tape of the proceedings and culling it down. The "Sieg Heil" part happens around minute four.
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So, if he has pledged to NEVER utter another word of German, that means that he can no longer say:
Volkswagen
Braunschweiger
Sauerkraut
Pumpernickel
Bratwurst
Liverwurst
just to list off a few...
Everyone here really, really needs to read the whole story. Really. It's on Huffington Post. Go find it before you jump to conclusions.
It is incredible that "We suppose to learn from errors we made in the past." And it seems the some bullies did not learned anything. Remind you of what happened; not in other parts of the world; but here is the USA. Remember the Prohibition Era? And the results were underground, stills, bars, contraband and the Mob taking over the cities. Is that what you want to happen again? In women rights, we have no business to manage their lives, nor the lives of the gay and lesbian people. "The is a slogan: And Justice for all." Does the Extreme right apply it when it comes to minorities? No! And comic said "Remember that the USSR did not collapse by an outside attack, it fell because the minorities were unhappy with the status quo." Tea party members, take a look on what austerity is doing in Europe. Where is the blindfold lady with the scales of justice?
Oh and one more thing: The right press refers to Romney as Gov. Romney, and President Obama, just as Obama. Hint, hint; racism perhaps? You right wingers are no Christians, you are make believe flip-flippers "religious on Sundays and I do what I want the rest of the time" A true Christian is to shoe respect to those in authority...etc.
I am mad, and I will do everything in my humble power to defeat Romney, the lair Mormon. When he pooses, I would not be surprised if he get kicked out of that Sect.
Yet again, the Right proves how completely immature they can be in the face of not getting their way.As if Joe Wilson's "You lie!" and Jan Brewer's finger in President Obama's face weren't enought to prove they are a pretty classless bunch. Stop screwing around on social issues, GOP. Anyone who is interested in taking our country back 150 years or so is just as pathetic as the 3 stooges.. "Where are the jobs?!" Cantor,Boehner and McConnell!
Anybody out there know what Mitt Romneys' grandfather did before the second world war??? He was the representative of a NY bank that actually did business, through other banks in Europe, to finance Hitlers move to power, brown shirts and all. Sad to hear about this thing in NH but seeing that the Arizona Republican Party supportted an Arizona state Representative that had been photographed in his Nazi uniform, it really doesn't surprise me to think that this kind of bigoted movement has people confused as to what the real truth is why these new laws are being passed. Historically the "Papers Please" issue came from trying to justify the efforts to identify all the "undesireable" people of Jewish descent. Now it is the Hispanics and those who cannot provide proof of their citizenship because of home births or other reasons!!! Shame on these people who are supposed to represent us and not themselves and their clearly bigoted agenda.
What is the big deal. I use this phrase as a show of contempt all the time. It's called freedom of speech, and naturally, vanilla conventional speech does not need protection. It is obnoxious speech which must be protected. Deal with it or find a more repressive country.
Is it me or do these guys say and do anything they want and then apologize for it later. Words like that should not ever come out of a Public Officials Lips.
To La Petite Tempete that said i cant wait to be an ex pat ..and good luck with your "peasant state" ..Go leave good bye don't let the gate for the boat hit your ass on your way out. The USA is a peasant state like Europe is capitalist. People like you we don't need. People that think America owes then anything need to go. Generations before us have sacrificed and persevered in-spite of huge obstacles,not for their individual benefit but for the benefit of all. As to Rep. Vallicourt and his words in the general court, what do you want we have a volenteer legislator they get paid either 200/yr or 200/every other year we have the 3rd or 4th largest legislator in the world and we only have 1 mill people. Is this some earth shattering thing..No Does it cast NH in a good light..prolly not ..did he do anything illegal ..no ..this is really a no story...as far as the 24 hour waiting period for an abortion ..I have lived in NH for 40 years and I have no problem what so ever with that.;.Killing a baby isnt something that should be taken lightly..and IMO society as a whole has an interest in Saving as many humans as possible."live free or Die" implies you are alive:) and lastly u people are so funny you want your perceived rights but have no problem stomping all over anyone's rights you don't believe in ..how typical..Religious institutions cant be made to pay for things they consider immoral. "freedom of religion " right ?? or is it freedom of religion if it is totally in live with what you think?? Pfft I have an idea why don't people that live outside of NE pay attention to their state, NH has a surplus we have a volunteer legislator we have no income or state sales tax, Over 80% of our state is woods like 17% is water. Unlike most other places in the USA we actually do take care of our own. We don't go crying to the feds every time we get a storm or a flood..we sent more people Per capita to NO then anyother state. Leave NH alone we are fine, we don't want your help or your comments. NH has continually done more then it's share for our country and the peeps here like it and we don't like what we call flatlanders or m@!$%#s trying to tell us what we should do . O and as always have a nice day . sorry but I get all pissy when people diss NH:) we have never gotten the respect we deserve:(
Watch the "apology." He makes me ashamed to be flamboyant.
http://concord-nh.patch.com/articles/rep-s-sieg-heil-causes-furor#video-9938919
As I live in NH and have very much been following the destruction our 'Republican'-lead legislature has brought upon my state, I feel some clarification is needed. There are many facts that are left to the imagination in the article.
Representative Valliancourt has a long history of bucking the "establishment" (which in today's terms would be the teabaggers that run the NH House) and in this session has run afoul of the Speaker, Bill O'Brien. So much so that he has been removed from his Finance Committee appointment.
For those who do not know, Bill O'Brien has ruled (yes ruled) the NH House with an iron fist. If members of his party disagree with him, he'll pull them from committees, change parking spaces, etc. Recently, a disabled former police officer and state Rep. disagreed with the speaker over right to work. His seat was moved from an aisle seat to the dead center of his row.
Flash forward to today and the debate about attaching amendments to bills that have nothing to do with their intended subject and following House rules lead to Rep. Valliancourt's outburst. I don't condone his choice of words, I don't really think anyone could. Ultimately this is a man who has had to put up with a lot and had basically had enough of a tyrannical man in Speaker O'Brien.
Oh, I'm so glad you said all of that!!! I didn't know that about the disabled former-officer-turned-state-rep, though. Wow... O'Brien has no shame whatsoever, and will stop at nothing to get what he wants. For anyone who can't understand where Vaillaincourt's comment came from, check this out:
http://www.rense.com/general37/fascism.htm
Thanks for posting this. I was in the middle of writing something about the Golden Dawn, and thinking about an old interview by Rachel that brought up the holocaust, and this kinda tied it all together:
http://freethoughtblogs.com/xblog/2012/05/15/freedom-of-speech-means-sometimes-you-shut-up/
What amazes me is how people are complaining and talking about moving to another country. There are so many of us and so few of these morons. Why not all band together and get them out? If we were motivated enough, the average Joe could run the country just fine without them. ...But it's easier to just let them run the country, and so they do.
Since Vaillancourt is so fond of German words, here's another one for him - dummkoph.
Typical state house politics in "Cow Hampshire".
NH is a wanna be ALEC pal. To anyone who thinks they might vote Republican: Remember when these same republicans PROMISED to CREATE JOBS? Where are the jobs? They are working instead on a nation wide voter suppression agenda. Dems and Independents...make sure in advance that you are legally registered and help ohters get registered too.
Der Mann ist total Bescheuert, und gehoert ins Knast!=
That man is a nut and belongs in jail!
I saw the story on the local news here in NH, but they emphasized the disruption, but not the reason. It does seem that the ruckus was all between Repubs, but the story made no sense. Thanks, channel 9, now I can go to Huff Post to find out what really happened!
If Romney wins and we lose the Senate and are unable to take back the house, it may be necessary for all of us to leave. These right wingers are psychopaths. I can easily imagine them making it a crime to be a liberal. The way they made it a crime to be a communist in the fifties.They are crazy. And what's frightening is how many skin head psychos there are in this country.
It was amusing to watch two bullies, O'Reilly and Van der Sloot try to bully the Dems by pretending they were bullied by the Dems, but it's horrible, too, because they're both nutjob bullies who are so insulated and rich that they can get away with anything. I believe O'Reilly is responsible for the murder of Dr. Tiller. And Van der Sloot has bullied an entire state. By the way, is Van der Sloot related to Joram Van der Sloot, the guy who is suspected of killing the blonde, American girl who disappeared on a Dutch Island
;and who is known to have killed a Peruvian girl? Fox covered the disappearance for what seemed like years.
Slime balls like this guy should lose their citizenship. Man without a country type of punishment. Enough of this crap that just because you are a congressman of the state or country you think you are above the law. This type of hate is so commonplace and we sit back like sheep and do nothing. I can remember when the republican party actually had decent people that cared about this country. Not anymore.....
We've come a long way from 2005, when just mentioning the word Nazi caused a sitting U.S. senator to have to make a tearful apology.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/21/AR2005062101654.html