There are famous lows in our nation’s history. I suppose one would see the signs beforehand, but everything is a lot clearer in the rearview mirror. We could see the signs of Civil War when we look backwards. I wonder what they saw when Charles Sumner was beaten on the Senate floor in 1856.

Will we look back on this latest flap over Rep. Paul Gosar as a blip on the radar or a precursor of things to come? For those that don’t want to go down the rabbit hole, essentially Gosar released a video on Twitter and Instagram of him killing Alexandria Ocasio-Cortes and also stabbing President Biden. As always, it is the aftermath of this situation that is so unsettling.

Democratic leadership is at a loss of what to do. On a number of levels I get it. A lot of this has to do with the momentum thing I discussed earlier this week. How much political capital do you want to expend to get rid of a guy that probably has zero political power? It was a lot like dealing with Marjorie Taylor Greene. If you do too much you end up martyring a nobody and giving them more oxygen. If you don’t do enough you encourage the behavior. It’s the no win scenario.

Kevin McCarthy apparently has been neutered for his own protection. He is not willing to stand up to anybody or anything. He’s the kid on the playground that all the bullies hit up for his lunch money. The only question is which bully will get to him first.

AOC is one of the more polarizing members of Congress. She might be the most polarizing member of Congress. Even for Democrats, you feel like you alternately love her and then want to shake some sense into her. That’s what happens when you speak your mind and never self-censor yourself. On some level, it is enviable that someone can go through life like that. On another it is frightening to see someone get that much vitriol for just speaking their mind.

In one of the oddities of this case, Gosar’s sister is one of his most vocal critics. That must be an interesting family come Thanksgiving. I think everyone should keep their head on a swivel lest the gravy bowl wind up on top of their head. However, no one can disagree with a word she says.

Everyone remembers the story of Kathy Griffin and the flap over 45’s severed head. The comedian had a somewhat promising career that went up in smoke. People don’t think that even subtle threats are funny and it doesn’t particularly matter who the subject is. Republicans and Democrats should be able to agree on this much.

That was a B-list comedian doing that. Now it is an actual member of Congress. I suppose there can be no greater illustration of where we are as a country. On one side, fringe entertainers are going a bridge too far or sound crazy. On the other side, actual representatives are going a bridge too far and sound crazy. Unfortunately, some people still don’t see the difference.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott’s latest fetish is pornography and he’s pretty much certain that it’s just all over schoolhouses hiding in full sight in places called “libraries.”

He wrote a letter this week directly to the Commissioner of the Texas Education Agency to drop whatever it is that he’s doing right now and to find the criminals who are putting pornography in our public schools.

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Jeff Hoverson is described as “an American politician, pastor and businessman who serves as a Republican member of the North Dakota House of Representatives.”

He also organized an anti-vaccine rally at the state capitol. And like clockwork, he cancelled because he has covid.

But it’s not that bad, he says, because some brave soul gave him ivermectin. So, apparently he has covid and horse worms.

And there’s more —

Although Hoverson could not attend the Monday rally, the representative told the AP that his three teenage children would be there in his absence. It is unclear whether they attended.

Okay, if I was doing a job that three teenagers could do, I would suspect that my job did not require maturity or good judgement.  And, apparently Hoverson’s job does not.  Because ….

A North Dakota lawmaker was barred from boarding a flight at Minot International Airport this week following a run-in with airport security.

Yeah, that was Jeff.  He didn’t like the pat-down.

Seems to me that Jeff is operating pretty much as you’d suspect for a man with horse worms.

Matthew McConaughey is still deciding if he wants to run for governor of Texas.

His little indecision game is hurting Democrats because no other Democrat wants to enter the race against him.  Meanwhile, if he’s not going to run we have some other real candidates who need to start campaigning.

He does a self indulgent interview with the New York Times and says – oh Lord — that he believes that politics can be art — and he happens to be an artist.

Dude, I’ve seen The Beach Bum, Free State of Jones, and Serenity. No. No, you’re not.

You’re cute as the dickens and you read other people’s words pretty well about 30% of the time but you are not an artist. We elected a guy who is not a professional politician and that’s how we got into this mess. Franklin Roosevelt was a professional politician, Dude. Donald Trump is not.

There is always positive momentum every time a major piece of legislation passes. It takes so long to get those things done. You have to corral your own caucus and make sure everyone gets what they need out of it. Then, you have to overcome the filibuster on the other side. I think you get the idea.

Congress passes legislation all the time. We often refer to Congress as a “do nothing” Congress and somehow assume they can only do one thing at a time. I think deep down we know this isn’t true, but when it comes to major issues this is certainly true. Now, the Democrats in Congress and the Justice Department have a choice they have to make.

How do they use this momentum? The positive feelings from passing a major piece of legislation like the infrastructure bill probably buys you only so much. You can push one thing forward and time is running out. The closer we get to the 2022 midterm elections the less that’s going to get done. We probably have time for them to do one other great thing.

As Yogi Berra once said, “when you reach a fork in the road. Take it.” Naturally, many of you are wondering what our choices are. We can certainly add to the economic impact of the infrastructure bill with items that were left out. Democrats initially wanted a much bigger package. They could damn the torpedoes and go for that.

The Democrats could take the momentum and go after the voting rights bill. I think this is the legislative direction most people want to go. If such a bill passed it would nullify the voter suppression bills passed in individual states and would add protections that could safeguard our democracy moving forward.

The last possibility involves the Justice Department. Congress has subpoenaed numerous officials from the Trump administration to answer for the big lie and the January 6th insurrection. How much did they plan? How much did they incite with their rhetoric? Can we prove they helped plan that event and that they knew the big lie was obviously false?

If they appear the simple answer would appear to be yes on all counts. We get two divergent questions from this point forward. The first question is how hard we pursue them to compel them to appear? The current strategy appears to be for them to just skip the appearances and let Congress and the Justice Department pursue them. If you play their game you could end up spending that entire momentum on getting them to admit what most rational people already know.

The second question is what to do once they admit what we already know. Do you throw them in jail? Do you simply use the material in campaigns moving forward? Do we make a huge effort to educate the public? All of this involves using pretty much all of that momentum we described earlier.

The upshot is that as long as the Democrats make a choice they will create some positive synergy for the next election cycle. Some choices are better than others, but the key is to get off the pot and make one. The alternative is paralysis by analysis. Factions bicker about what to do and you look up and it’s November 2022. The unfortunate part of opportunity costs is that you have to choose something. The clock is ticking.