Curbing Somebody's Enthusiasm: Some Facts to Reassure Speaker Pelosi

Once again, instead of a substantive discussion about policies, the focus is on feelings - this time, fear.

"I wish that we would all, again, curb our enthusiasm in some of the statements that are made," Pelosi said Thursday. Some of the people hearing the message "are not as balanced as the person making the statement might assume," she said.

Could you be more specific?

Pelosi's office did not immediately respond to a request from the Associated Press for examples of contemporary statements that reminded the speaker of the rhetoric of 1970s San Francisco.

No specifics on the rhetoric front, huh? Well, on the violence front, the Weekly Standard's Mary Katharine Ham has some data that might interest you, Madam Speaker.

That's the full list of documented violence from the August meetings. In more than 400 events: one slap, one shove, three punches, two signs grabbed, one self-inflicted vandalism incident by a liberal, one unsolved vandalism incident, and one serious assault. Despite the left's insistence on the essentially barbaric nature of Obamacare critics, the video, photographic, and police report evidence is fairly clear in showing that 7 of the 10 incidents were perpetrated by Obama supporters and union members on Obama critics.

Now, see how much better it is to deal in facts rather than wallow in emotion? All of that worrying for naught.