“Behind me, a filled room of 9/11 first responders, and in front of me, a nearly empty Congress,” Stewart said.
John Stewart spoke to many empty seats in a House Committee about the needs of first responders. All these years later and the men and women who responded “in five seconds” to a disaster: “I’m awfully tired of hearing that it’s a 9/11 New York issue. Al-Qaeda didn’t shout death to Tribeca. They attacked America, and these men and women … brought our country back,” and are still having to beg for relief.
“I’m sorry if I sound angry and undiplomatic, but I’m angry, and you should be, too, and they’re all angry as well and they have every justification to be that way.”
Watch the PBS News Hour video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=10&v=HT5FTrIZN-E
Stewart alludes to a Senator who has held up funding as a political tool? That’s Mitch McConnell.
Truth to power.
IMPERFECT PATIENCE 
Indeed. I watched a clip and could barely keep my tears back. My husband did a bit of lobbying for the Peace Corps and a Vietnam veterans group years ago. His experience was that Congress men and women do not like being told truth to power, they don’t like it when someone calls them out on their hypocrisy and apathy. But I’m grateful for every single word that Stewart uttered, for the rawness of his criticism.
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Few are glad to hear about their failures.
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