By The Associated Press
09.17.2009 4:12pm EDT
(Washington) House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Thursday that the
anti-government rhetoric over President Barack Obama’s health care reform
effort is concerning because it reminds her of the violent debate over gay
rights that roiled San Francisco in the 1970s.
“I have concerns about some of the language that is being used because I
saw this myself in the late ’70s in San Francisco,” Pelosi said, suddenly
speaking quietly. “This kind of rhetoric was very frightening” and created a
climate in which violence took place, she said. Former San Francisco Supervisor Dan White was convicted of the 1978
murders of Mayor George Moscone and openly gay supervisor Harvey Milk. Gay
rights activists and some others at the time saw a link between the
assassinations and the violent debate over gay rights that had preceded them
for years. During a rambling confession, White was quoted as saying, “I saw the
city as going kind of downhill.” His lawyers argued that he was mentally ill at
the time. White committed suicide in 1985. Pelosi is part of a generation of California Democrats on whom the
assassinations had a searing effect. A resident of San Fransisco, Pelosi had
been a Democratic activist for years and knew Milk and Moscone. At the time of
their murders, she was serving as chairwoman of her party in the northern part
of the state. On Thursday, Pelosi was answering a question about whether the current
vitriol concerned her. The questioner did not refer to the murders of Milk or
Moscone, or the turmoil in San Francisco three decades ago. Pelosi referenced
those events on her own and grew uncharacteristically emotional. “I wish that we would all, again, curb our enthusiasm in some of the
statements that are made,” Pelosi said. Some of the people hearing the message
“are not as balanced as the person making the statement might assume,” she
said. “Our country is great because people can say what they think and they
believe,” she added. “But I also think that they have to take responsibility
for any incitement that they may cause.” Pelosi’s office did not immediately respond to a request for examples of
contemporary statements that reminded the speaker of the rhetoric of 1970s San
Francisco. The public anger during health care town hall meetings in August spilled
into the House last week when South Carolina Republican Joe Wilson shouted “You
lie!” at Obama, the nation’s first black president, during his speech. On a
largely party-line vote, the House reprimanded Wilson.