And now for something completely different…

Congressman Alan Grayson is mixing things up pretty good. It’s kind of a man-bites-dog story – Republicans are all over the page with insults and smears, death panels and granny dying off in a waiting queue. Some pundits, like Ann Coulter and Glenn Beck, earn their paychecks by being outrageous. They are mediocre at best, hardly worth a mention. They surely know that their stock goes up with each insult.

Grayson got up on the floor of the House and merely said something true – that Republicans have no health care plan. Therefore, their plan must be “don’t get sick”. Or, if you do get sick, “die quickly”.

Screams of indignation followed. Republicans demanded an apology. Instead, Grayson countered by apologizing to the 44,000 plus who (according to a Harvard study) die each year due to lack of health care.

Rachel Maddow noted the other night that Grayson’s opponents are not to be found, and that the Florida Republican Party is barrel-bottom-scraping to come up with an opponent for Grayson. I don’t know what poll results show, but I’d be very surprised if Grayson’s numbers did not shoot up for saying something true. That sometimes happens – politicians sometimes say something that is true, that is. Polls alwasy shoot up in the aftermath.

Which highlights the frustration of being a Democrat. They are such wimps and weasels, many coached to be that way, others merely filling the role of the ratchet. The health care debate was theirs to win- they started out ahead by two touchdowns and a field goal. They had the numbers, they had public support. But because they have Emmanuel’s and Baucus’s and Reid’s instead of Grayson’s for leadership, they have blown it. The very best we can hope for a this point is co-ops, or as Steve W. calls them, “co-opts”.

Anyway, Grayson has made a high profile for himself. Let’s hope the Democrats don’t try to cut him off at the knees in 2010.

P.S. Grayson has an impressive biography (courtesy Wiki, no doubt supplied by Grayson’s people):

Grayson was born in the Bronx, New York and grew up in the tenements. He graduated from Bronx High School of Science and worked his way through Harvard University, graduating in three years, summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa. He worked as an economist for two years, but then returned to Harvard for graduate studies. Within four years, he earned a law degree with honors from Harvard Law School, a masters in public policy from the John F. Kennedy School of Government and completed the course work and passed the general exams for a Ph.D. in government.[3][4]

After writing his master’s thesis on gerontology, Grayson founded the Alliance for Aging Research, and served as an officer of the organization for more than 20 years.