It won't happen anytime soon, but Rep. Lynn Woolsey wants to bring it up in the next session of Congress. Obviously, I'd like to see it happen; I really, really want to watch as Republican and Blue Dogs explain why they oppose something that cuts $68 billion from the federal budget deficit, and tell us it makes much more sense to cut Social Security!

As both political parties worry about the growing federal deficit, an unlikely proposal is returning from last year's divisive healthcare debate: the "public option."

Creating a major government health insurance program was roundly rejected last year, but 128 House Democrats are pushing to reconsider the idea, contending that it would hold down federal spending.

Their bill, which faces long odds, would allow Americans who do not get insurance at work to choose a government health plan starting in 2014.

"There is all this concern about the deficit," said Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-Petaluma), a leading champion of the proposal. "Well, guess what: This would reduce the deficit because it saves so much money."

Woolsey and her allies, including Rep. Pete Stark (D-Fremont), are armed with a new analysis by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. Democrats say the CBO projects that the public option could save the government $68 billion between 2014 and 2020.

The government's administrative costs would be lower than private insurers', proponents say, and it could pay hospitals and doctors less. That would mean lower premiums — and lower government subsidies for policyholders who need them.

Insurance companies, hospitals and other businesses say a public option would undermine employer-provided insurance and set the stage for a so-called single-payer system, in which the government would be the only insurer.

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I guess some people are noticing that we're seeing a spike in vigilante violence on the border, largely associated with white "Minuteman" patrols. Rep. Pete Stark fired back at one of the Minutemen at a public meeting last week, and it stirred Glenn Beck's ire:

REP. PETE STARK (D-CA): The Minutemen want to have something to say? Who are you going kill today?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Who are we going to kill today?

STARK: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I would just like to know — actually, American citizens are being killed right now. That's what's going on.

STARK: That's right.

This really set Beck off:

Let me just clear up a few of the stark raving lies here. Even though Stark has some sort of minutemen shoot everybody on sight smear campaign going on, the fact is there has never been a border shooting involving a Minuteman, not one! Zero! None!

No violent episodes from the Minutemen. I mean, this guy doesn't let a single fact get in his way.

We have a "single fact" or two for Glenn Beck, though, that might kind of get the way of his claim.

Indeed, we'd like Glenn Beck to meet someone.

Her name was Brisenia Flores. She was nine years old and lived near the border with her parents and sister outside the town of Arivaca, Arizona. On May 30 of last year, a woman named Shawna Forde, who led an offshoot unit of Minutemen who ran armed border patrols for patriotic "fun". Forde's gang had decided to go "operational," which meant they concocted a scheme to raid drug smugglers and take their money and drugs and use it to finance a border race war and "start a revolution against the government". They mistakenly chose the Flores home, which had neither money nor drugs; first they shot the father in the head and wounded the mother, and then, while she pleaded for her life, they shot Brisenia in cold blood. (Her sister, fortunately, was sleeping over at a friend's.)

You can listen to the wounded mother's 911 call here:

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It's not as if Shawna Forde was a renegade Minuteman, either, though she did run an offshoot (which is how the majority of Minutemen are organizing these days, the large national organizations having gone kaput). Indeed, Forde served as a spokesperson for FAIR and was closely involved with Minutemen leader Jim Gilchrist right up to the time of her arrest. (In fact, we're going to learn at her trial this fall just how close -- including whether or not Gilchrist tipped her off that federal authorities were looking for her).

That's just one incident. Others are beginning to manifest themselves even now.

Maybe if Glenn Beck were a little better informed about just what his pet Minutemen have been up to, he might avoid these kinds of mistakes. But we doubt it.

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Somethings never change. Rep. Pete King has a history of spewing ridiculous statements when it comes to war and national security. As TPM puts it:

In recent years, the New York Republican has gained a reputation for demagoguing every terror incident by hyping the threat of radical Islam and suggesting that Democrats' policies are putting Americans' lives at risk. And now he's back at it.

Whenever there's a hint of trouble he's Johnny on the dime to give asinine quotes that the media laps up in his effort to smear anyone who's not a Republican.

After Faisal Shahzad,the suspected NYC bomber failed at his task, it was time to fill air space on cable -- and like clockwork King got himself on the tube to pass along his latest demagoguery. With the case of NYC being only hours old and no tangible information available, good old Pete tried to guess what the motive might be for this violent act. Out of the endless possibilities of what might have triggered the terrorist attack, King decided to hypothesize that "South Park" was a possible target.

Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.), the ranking member of the House Homeland Security Committee, said that a car bomb found Saturday night in Times Square might have been the work of Islamic extremists who were upset over an episode of the Comedy Central series that attempted to depict the prophet Muhammad. It's one possibility out of 100, but this vehicle was close to a Viacom building, which owns MTV and Comedy Central," King said Sunday during an appearance on CNN. "

CNN's John King found that puzzling as well and asked him if he got a little ahead of himself by naming South Park as a target.

John King: Earlier today you raised some eyebrows when you were trying to figure out who might be responsible for this and you were being careful when you said "might," but you did say one possibility and again, this is one possibility, close to the Viacom building you were saying at the outrage the South Park incidents not that long ago. Was that perhaps getting a little ahead of yourself?

Pete King: No, not really because I know that it is being looked at by investigators as one of the possibilities. Iwas going down the list of possibilities and that is one of them to show again how many things the police and the joint terrorism task force have to look at and that is one of them.

Since the Pathfinder was parked near Viacom, which is home to Comedy Central which hosts South Park, that was all the proof Stark needed to pass it along to the mainstream. Why was he speculating?

King has no problem in a time of crisis and a possible terrorist attack to grab a microphone, and to me it sounds like he's publicizing tactics law enforcement use when dealing with these incidents so that he can make himself appear very, very important and in the know. I would expect a pundit to make this kind of assertion, but for a congressman to offer wild speculation hours after an incident is almost criminal. I repeat, why is he there at all at a time of crisis?

King was out front and center when the "Underwear Bomber" struck, even before people had a chance to open up their Christmas presents so that he could denounce President Obama.

I'll never forget when he told an audience at a Jewish center in 2006, and as the Iraq war was raging that shopping in Baghdad was just like hanging out in Manhattan.

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King: Conditions on the ground are different than what you see on television.---As we go through the city of Baghdad, it was like being in Manhattan. I’m talking about bumper to bumper traffic. Talking about shopping centers, talking about restaurants, talking about video stores, talking about guys--on the street corner, talking about major hotels. And so, at that moment, people must be amazingly resilient and you would never know that there was a war going on...

...in Mosul---I remember seeing news reports about roller coasters. Where you had two or three parking lots filled with their cars on a Sunday afternoon. Again, that’s not something you’d see on television, and at any given time a suicide bombers can walk into an amusement center, but the point I’m making is that the situation is more stable than you think....

I wish the media would ignore this fool, but conservatives can never say anything too far out or too far right.

Good. This was a distraction we don't need. He'll be replaced by Pete Stark:

WASHINGTON - After being admonished by an ethics panel for accepting corporate-sponsored trips to the Caribbean, Rep. Charlie Rangel, D-N.Y., said Wednesday that he will take a leave of absence from his chairmanship of the powerful House Ways and Means committee.

Rangel made the announcement to reporters on Capitol Hill, saying he would not answer any questions.

"I hope you don't mind. I don't take questions," he said.

He added that "from the very, very beginning, I had offered" to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to step down from the post. He said he was leaving now "to avoid my colleagues having to defend me" during the campaign season.

As the House prepares to take up a resolution of disapproval over Rep. Joe Wilson’s outburst during last week’s appearance by President Obama to a joint session of Congress, the wingnuts have found what they claim to be “hypocrisy” on the Democrats part.

This video is from 2007 when Rep. Pete Stark was saying how Bush lied:

Now let’s go back to the current event. The Democrats asked Joe Wilson to apologize on the House floor for his outburst and he flat out refused. It was that refusal that led to this motion.

What happened with Pete Stark? Well something the wingnuts aren’t willing to admit, yet I found out on HotAir – a rightwing blog:

Boehner introduced a censure resolution this morning knowing that the Democrats would have to kill it and symbolically line up on Stark’s side, which they did. That was enough for Pelosi, evidently: after he initially refused to apologize, after the fight-fight-fightin’ nutroots very predictably made it a point of pride that he not apologize, the good congressman has duly considered the Speaker’s rebuke from Friday and … apologized.

So the minority party introduced a resolution of censure, which was killed. But that didn’t put an end to it, Stark ended up doing the right thing and apologizing to the House and President. Wilson is refusing to apologize to the House.

Of course even Hot Air is now jumping on the “hypocrisy” bandwagon. (Note to Captain Ed – check out your own archives first!)

If there is any hypocrisy here, it is on the part of Republicans. They wanted to censure Pete Stark, but couldn’t do it since they were in the minority (remember – elections have consequences). But when it comes to Joe Wilson, they are circling the wagons. They haven’t pushed him to apologize on the House floor, but the Democrats did and he refused.

Also let’s remember what the motions are. The Republicans wanted to censure Pete Stark. That’s the second highest level of punishment in the House, with expulsion topping it. For Joe Wilson, the Democrats are wanting a resolution of “disapproval”, which is the most minor disciplinary action in the House – essentially a slap on the wrist.

So thanks wingnuts for proving that the House’s reaction to Wilson is proper. Hell they are actually letting him off easy. It’s Wilson who is refusing to play by the rules.

The "Battered Spouse Syndrome" has hit the Congressional Democrats. Again.

House Minority Leader John "Cry Baby" Boehner got the vay-puhs (can't you see him clutching his pearls in horror?) from Rep. Pete Stark's harsh words after the SCHIP vote last week...what delicate sensibilities the minority party has! My gosh, it's almost as if Rep. Stark was heartless enough to be glib about the lives of our troops in harm's way. So naturally, because we can't have mean words or insinuations that our President isn't a Very Serious Person, Boehner introduced a privileged resolution to censure Pete Stark.

Chairman Bennie Thompson moved to table the resolution (which basically meant that they weren't going to consider it; all these ridiculous parliamentary procedures give me a headache) and the resolution was tabled with a vote of 196-173.

Howie at DWT:

You might be interested in knowing that 5 Democrats voted with the Republicans on condemning Rep Stark and another 8-- all reactionaries-- voted "Present," refusing to come to Stark's defense. You can probably guess the names of the disgraceful 13 Democrats. Howie has the list here.

Despite the tabling of the resolution, an apparently chastened Stark did formally apologize:

(thanks to TPM for vid)