One question keeps popping up after watching the mess in congress this week. I bet it's bouncing around most of your minds, too.
How did Butthead get into the House of Representatives?
The disclaimer on Beavis and Butthead stated clearly: "Beavis and Butthead are not role models. They're not even human. They're cartoons."
We'll stop there. Somebody lied. Who knew the cartoon character named Butthead would be a congressman named Gaetz thirty years later.
The eyes don't lie.
Gaetz is just one of a handful of animated characters brought to life to turn Washington into the worst cartoon on cable. You can get it on a dozen different channels drawn from a dozen different angles. But it's all the same cartoon.
So we've got Zoidburg dropping whoopee cushions and Natasha Fatale chasing roadrunners with an ACME slingshot. Homer Comer rhymes with Gomer repeated several two syllable words for the cameras. But that wasn't enough.
Butthead decided to throw a live grenade into the episode because (pick one):
a. he was angry with Speaker SpongeBob for working with the Democrats to keep the government running.
b. he was angry with the Speaker for letting an ethics review move forward investigating his involvement in a sex ring with Mr. Burns.
c. Cartman told him to create some chaos to take attention from his ninety something pending felony charges.
d. To see what would happen.
In true cartoon fashion the correct answer is "all of the above" which is not an option. You can only pick one, so no one is right. This is what freedom is about.
Butthead wanted Speaker SpongeBob out and got what he wanted. Which is chaos.
It'll be chaos until a new Speaker of the House is elected. Who knows when that might be? The batwing of the loony tunes won't vote for anyone who might work with the other 48.7% of the body. The rest of the caucus doesn't want another batwing in charge. This could go on till Christmas.
It'll for sure go on until my next deadline. They're not even going to get in a room and start throwing M-80s at one another until next Tuesday. All I can say is they better not smoke my birthday column.
Since they're looking for a Speaker, maybe they'll pick a guy with 41 years representing one of the poorest congressional districts in the country. Over four decades of things not getting any better is true north for conservatism, after all.
While we're waiting, it might be in our favor to finish that disclaimer from the cartoon we started with. The rest of it read: "Some of the things they do would cause a person to get hurt, expelled, arrested, possibly deported. To put it another way: don't try this at home."
Focus on the words after 'some of the things they do' because we've been watching those things for a few years now. People have gotten hurt, expelled and arrested.
It says don't try this at home right there on the label. Isn't the House a home? Study that disclaimer Shaggy and pass me a Scooby snack.