Never one to shy away from inflammatory rhetoric, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) called for an "insurrection" against the Republican party if the new class of GOP leadership -- from which she is notably absent -- doesn't successfully advance a "complete and utter" repeal of health care reform.
"If they don't, I think there needs to be an insurrection here in Washington, D.C, against our own leadership -- because that is the message that's come loud and clear out of this election: a full-scale repudiation and rejection of the federal government takeover of private industry," Bachmann said in a recent interview with CNSNews. "This is completely antithetical to American history to have the federal government take over, and run, and control and direct, and own private businesses. Our economy can not turn around if we turn away from the model of free enterprise."
Sensing some uncertainty, her interviewer asked how she felt about the Republican leadership's plans to call for an up-or-down vote on the matter.
"Well, I take them at their word," said Bachmann. "I believe the best in them, and I take them at their word when they say this is what they're going to do. But if they decide they're going to cave, or go weak in the knees, you will see members of Congress that will stand up against our leadership because we're going to stand with the people on this issue."
Bachmann later continued, saying that "repeal and replace" -- a proposal put forth in the GOP's "Pledge to America" and recently decried by the House Tea Party Caucus -- isn't sufficient, and that the only acceptable option would be "to return free markets to health care."
The fiery congresswoman has displayed her knack for controversy of this nature before, once, in 2009, calling for voters to get "armed and dangerous" in order "fight back" against President Obama's cap-and-trade climate and energy proposal. Not even a week after that she clarified, saying that what she really wanted was an "orderly revolution" against Obama's "economic Marxism."
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