Previous multi-recipient Tom Cotton, (R)(Arkansas), whose thoughts on such matters as civil disobedience and crime and punishment wouldn’t seem out of place in a screed authored by Kin Jong Un, titled Dear Leader’s Thoughts on the Duties and Obligations of Obedient Subjects. Tom won the first of his previous Gomeys for opining that the problem with America – a nation that imprisons more of its citizens, both in absolute and per capita terms, than any other nation on the planet, democratic or authoritarian – is that not enough people get sent to the slam, and too many get back out once they’re sent there. He won another for advocating, in an opinion column that the frickin’ New York Times saw fit to publish, that the U.S. Army should be responding to Black Lives Matter protests, implying, just barely subtextually, that soldiers should be gunning down demonstrators in the streets of American cities. In keeping with this freedom-loving, humanitarian bent, he just Tweeted this about a current set of admittedly misguided activists, now agitating over the situation in Gaza, who’re doing such things as blocking the streets with their own bodies in major cities across the country, snarling traffic from San Francisco to New York:
He also took to the airwaves, entertaining Fox viewers with statements like this, have a listen:
Yup. They’d know how to handle this bull puckey back home in Arkansas, boy, let me tell you something, it’d be right off that friggin’ bridge, and if the communist peckerheads have crazy-glued their hands to the hood of your jeep or some such shit, well, fuckit, they were bound to lose some skin anyway. Rip ’em loose, then over the railing with ’em for an educational plunge into the muddy Arkansas river far below, and if they don’t survive the fall, or can’t swim, no big deal, somebody can fish their bloated corpses out of the water when they wash up downstream somewhere on the banks of the Mississippi. If you’re not lucky enough to be dealing with the morons on a bridge, you can still “take matters into your own hands to get them out of the way”, for which read just run ’em over. That’s right. Roll right over the bastards in your F-150, give ’em a little taste of some good, down-home, steel-belted radial therapy, see how they like them apples. That’s how Bubba and Buford would deal with it back in Little Rock, sure as God made Loblolly Pines and Momma baked cornbread.
Look, I think this form of protest is a pain in the ass too, and I’m particularly disgusted with supposedly liberal youth in Western societies going beyond understandable dismay with an ugly situation in war-torn Gaza to the point of expressing sympathy for a terrorist death cult like Hamas, but you know, the whole spirit of our little experiment in democratic self-rule is that they get to do that. Only to a point, sure. I’ve no doubt it’s illegal to block public thoroughfares, and I sympathize with the frustration, as I’m likewise no fan of being harassed as I go about my lawful business by every A-hole who’s got an axe to grind, but the remedy for illegal nuisance in a free and open society is to call the cops, is it not, Senator Cotton?
Nope, says Tom. Fuck ’em. They want to plant their asses in the middle of the street, fine, it’s pedal to the metal in the cab of this-here patriot’s Dodge Durango.
I’ve always felt a particular squirming distaste for Tom Cotton. It’s not just that he’s a typically hypocritical, lying GOP asshole with authoritarian fantasies of permanent White minority rule, heck, that covers off most of the caucus these days, it’s also that he’s a bit of a, well, weirdo. He’s always walking around with this vexed, somewhat pained expression on his oddly angular face, like he’s just realized he’s begun passing yet another goddam kidney stone, when three this year already ought to have been goddam plenty, for the love of Christ:
…and, like a lot of self-styled tough guys, he’s a bit of a gangly pencil-neck, his strangely exaggerated features making him appear like a sort of cartoon character, reminiscent of a cross between a scarecrow and one of those improbable-looking wading birds, like a heron, or a stork maybe. In prior posts, I’ve likened him to Disney’s conception of Ichabod Crane:
Give him a ponytail and a tricorn hat, and all we need is somebody to play the headless horseman, amiright?
I suppose it isn’t fair to slam a guy on his looks, I mean, your faithful scribe here ain’t exactly Paul Newman either, but sometimes, certain loathsome characters make you wonder whether there might have been something to that phrenology business after all. Some people simply look the part, and this guy appears just exactly like the nasty, maladjusted, walking-around-with-a-broom pole-up-his-ass creep that he truly is. Just look at the mook when he’s attempting to smile like a real live person:
Yikes! That’s the kind of rictus grin you’d expect on the puss of a ‘gator, or maybe a Boa Constrictor.
Anyway, Tom, here’s another one for your trophy case. I guess you’re now on the cusp of a coveted Standing Gomey. We here at the Needlefish will be diligent about keeping tabs, and bestowing one as soon as it’s earned, as surely it will be soon enough.
the needlefish 