“This country needs a therapist. White men [are] losing their power to brown women and it’s freaking them out.” Michele Stern

Last week, for the first time in eleven years, the House of Representatives voted to censure a member. This is a big deal, it turns out, and it has only happened eight times in the last hundred years. It got me wondering what the other centureés did. When I look at pictures of an old white man dressed in a suit with a starched collar, I default to smart, thoughtful, guy; I am reminded of both my grandfathers. But reading through several of the old cases has changed my mind. Not surprisingly, the House of Representatives has a long history of nasty rubes and Republican Paul Representative Gosar seems to be one of them.

That’s not completely surprising since Cozar represents a big chunk of Arizona’s boondocks, his district has been drawn to leave out both Phonix and Flagstaff to make it even more boondocky. In an act of petty meanness Gozar posted an anime video depicting himself killing Rep. Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez. I have not seen the video – and, believe me, I tried – but nobody, including Gosar himself, denies that it depicts him killing AOC so I am going to go with that. The whole thing is so bizarre, I’m having a hard time wrapping my head around it. I can’t imagine a situation in which doing something like that would be acceptable, well, maybe two close friends with a history of teasing each other, but when else? In this case, they are not friends, and AOC has a history of being threatened by various right-wing haters. Serious enough threats that the Secret Service, FBI, and Capitol Police were brought in, more than once.

Gosar, in his defense, said that it was a joke, he meant no harm, and that AOC doesn’t have a sense of humor. I guess he thought it was a joke, but it was either a thoughtless, nasty, joke and Gosar should be kicked out of Congress because he is too stupid to make even basic decisions or it was meant to harm AOC. Either way, if this happened in the private sector, I’m sure Gosar would be fired.

What I find most disturbing about Gozar’s so-called joke is not the anime – it’s not surprising that there is a jerk in Congress – but that all but two Republican Representatives voted against censure. All but two Republican members of Congress think it is pretty much OK to make and post a video of yourself killing another member of Congress. The two Republican women who spoke sort of ignored the whole death threat joke thingy and complained about the process and the speed at which punishment had been served. Speaker McCarthy rambled on for close to three hours saying nothing particularly germane. And Representative Ocasio-Cortez gave another great speech cutting to the core of the problem. Give it a listen.