OK.  So many Americans are disenchanted with the direction of the country, specifically the health care legislation that was passed this week.  One can disagree with policies – that is reasonable and to be expected.

So now it’s alright to threaten, intimidate and otherwise cast scurrilous invectives at our Congressional representatives – particularly by other members of Congress?

If the more civil party members of the Republicans and Tea Party (as for the latter, one has to wonder if “civil party members” isn’t an oxymoron) are sincerely interested in preserving the State of the Union, they would be well advised to tone down the rhetoric before something tragic happens that will ignite unforeseen consequences.

House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R.- Virgina) is a case in point.  Cantor has suddenly decided that he wants to weigh in on this issue ONLY after his own Congressional office back home was fired upon by an unknown gunman.  Cantor is now accusing Democrats of “fanning the flames” by reporting these acts, but said NOTHING prior to this when a member of his own Republican Party used language that was beyond incendiary, to wit:

1) House Minority Leader John Boehner (not ironically, Cantor’s “boss”) said this week of fellow Ohio Congressman Steve Driehaus (D – Ohio), after Driehaus voted for the Health Care Reform Bill, “He may be a dead man. He can’t go home to the west side of Cincinnati.”

Moreover, Tea Party activists protesting on the Capitol steps spewed racist remark towards several members of the Congressional Black Caucus, and even spit on black Congressman Emmanuel Cleaver (D – MO). 

Cantor, who is of Jewish decent, claims that he has been the target of racist threats and invectives since he took office.  Given that fact, coupled with the history of his own people, you think he would have spoken up earlier in the week. The silence of the German people regarding the slowly fermenting racist hatred towards the Jews by members of the Nazi party in the 1930’s was an act of omission – a moral crime, in and of itself.  We all know what happened next.  Cantor, of all people, should understand the unintended consequences of not speaking up sooner. 

Yet, only now after he became a target of this decidedly un-American behavior, was Cantor quoted as saying, “Enough is enough, it has to stop.”

Yes Mr. Cantor, you are right. 

You just should have spoken up a long, long time ago.