My New Hero: Rep. Alan Grayson

One of the reasons it took me almost two decades to join formally the Democratic party, after my short time as a Republican, was because of the utter spinelessness that I saw in the party. The GOP has been like that annoying Chihuahua that barks at any and everything, and the Democrats generally have cowered, as if that bark were coming from a Pit Bull. It took the charismatic Obama to come along for me to formally associate with the Democrats last year. To keep me in the party, I need to see more people like Rep. Alan Grayson.

In my previous post, I noted that I'd only heard of the man after reading a blog post by Matt Taibbi over at True/Slant. Taibbi embedded a vid of Grayson questioning the General Counsel of the Federal Reserve. Here it is:



Once I stopped laughing (while also cheering), I figured that I was done seeing Grayson for a while. But then came Tuesday evening, and Grayson's spot on satirical assessment of the GOP plan for health insurance reform:



I have not laughed that hard since the premiere of the new "Family Guy." It felt good to see a Democrat, and a freshman House member no less, fight back. He put the GOP's obstructing and obfuscating tactics out in the street, which someone needed to have done a minute ago. It was even better to watch him on CNN's "The Situation Room," where the world was subjected to watching Wolf Blitzer and crew (with the exception of James Carville) try to berate Grayson for essentially not being nice. Where were these people when GOP House members were accusing Democrats en masse of attempting to kill people through health insurance reform legislation? I was watching a media fueled double standard unfold (yet again) right before my eyes:



And, I just stumbled upon the small little gem that Grayson, in response to the congressional rescinding any and all funding to ACORN, has decided to use the broad language of the legislation as written to go after any fraudulent organization that uses taxpayer dollars. I would love to see Grayson go after as many defense contractors the way he went after the Federal Reserve's General Counsel, starting with Blackwater (or whatever it's called now) and moving seamlessly to Halliburton and its subsidiaries.

So for all of the reasons that I have highlighted here, Rep. Alan Grayson is my new hero. Many of the more "high profile" Democrats need Grayson to provide them with a refresher course in good old fashioned indignation and disgust. And every single member of the GOP on the Hill, I hope, has been forewarned that this particular Democrat might be a potential force to be reckoned with. I hope Grayson keeps doing his thing.