Congressman ignored threat to President

Georgia Congressman Paul Broun now says he was stunned after an elderly man at a town hall meeting said, "Who is going to shoot Obama?"

Broun was so stunned that it took him three days to finally issue his own statement on the comment, which was reported in the Athens (Ga.) Banner-Herald.

[Broun's response was] Two witnesses told a Talking Points Memo reporter that Broun laughed along with the audience to the question.

"The thing is, I know there's a lot of frustration with this president," according to the Athens Banner-Herald. "We're going to have an election next year. Hopefully, we'll elect somebody that's going to be a conservative, limited-government president ... who will sign a bill to repeal and replace Obamacare."

"There's a lot of frustration"? Broun [equivocation] essentially tied shooting the president of the United States to those not happy with President Obama's policies.

Admittedly this is from the end of February but its the first I heard about it. I remember the last Presidential election cycle that John McCain was confronted by an older lady who said that Obama was an Arab and McCain corrected her right away.

I just find it sad that any citizen would say this, let alone that any publicly elected official would just ignore such a comment after the recent shooting of Gifford in AZ.

Reply 1 : Congressman ignored threat to President

...is whether the Secret Service ignored it. They don't laugh stuff like that off.

I remember that McCain Town Hall. Unfortunately his response was rather awkward:

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1008/14479.html

McCain passed his wireless microphone to one woman who said, "I can't trust Obama. I have read about him and he's not, he's not uh - he's an Arab. He's not - " before McCain retook the microphone and replied:

"No, ma'am. He's a decent family man [and] citizen that I just happen to have disagreements with on fundamental issues and that's what this campaign's all about. He's not [an Arab]."

The obvious and unfortunate implication in McCain's response is that being an Arab and being a decent family man are mutually exclusive.

Reply 2 : Congressman ignored threat to President

... but they were not initially involved by the Congressman.

Greg Sargent reports that he spoke with the Secret Service, which did not take the comment so lightly. The spokesman reports the Secret Service interviewed the constituent who made the comment and "determined that he or she was an 'elderly person' who now regrets making a bad joke."

I think we all have moments in our lives where we realize, after the fact, that something needed to be said - in the exact moment - to refute a thoughtless remark or action. Those who do the right thing at the right moment are the people who display true leadership. Those who ignore their gaffes, or worse try to make excuses... are the ones we need to remember, and replace come the next election cycle.