Republican Politics of Intimidation
I cannot know what U.S. Representative McMorris Rodgers (R-CD5, Eastern Washington State) thinks, but I can know how she votes. On November 17th, CMR, along with all but five of her fellow Republicans in the House, cast a Nay vote on HR 789, the resolution censuring Representative Paul Gosar (R-AZ) for promoting violence by publishing on social media an edited anime video depiction of him killing Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and attacking President Joe Biden. This Nay vote of CMR’s is demonstrates one of two things: 1) that she has forsaken all claims to the image of decency she tries to project as a middle-aged Christian mom or 2) that she is completely cowed by the Trump Republican Party, many gun-toting potential enforcers for which reside in her district.
Attesting to the fear of the mafia Don’s enforcers, we have this from Miles Taylor, the former aide to Donald Trump who during the administration published as “Anonymous”:
That fear evolved, toward the end of Trump’s administration, into a much more visceral fear of potential violent retribution. And I’m talking about former Cabinet secretaries, sitting members of Congress and others who personally confessed to me, “I don’t think I can join you in rising up against this guy because I’ve got to worry about my family’s safety.” I didn’t see it going there with those people. I didn’t anticipate how much I was going to hear that as a response. They would say to me, “Look, I’ve got kids and this is too crazy right now.”
To date, McMorris Rodgers’ website is silent on her reasoning for her Nay vote and there has been no response to an inquiry. Of course, now that Goser’s video has been taken down from social media (including his re-posting of it after he was censured), it is not easy to find a copy. Absent a copy, conservative media outlets are free to play down its content, or, I suppose, even alter the content and re-present it in a less damning form. However, one of the most popular far right websites, The Gateway Pundit, claims to offer the unedited video with the leading title to the article: “HERE IS THE SILLY VIDEO Rep. Paul Gosar Posted that Tyrant Pelosi Is Using to Demand He is Removed from His Congressional Committees — What a Joke” That is an interesting preface for the video itself—which you can watch at the bottom of the linked article or here where I have uploaded it.
I encourage you to watch the one and a half minute video to see if you think it is “silly” or “a joke” or something worthy of censure. I expected a pure Japanese anime (the term implies an entirely animated work) with faces superimposed on some of the animated characters in the original video, something quite crude, but possibly excusable as sophomoric. Instead, whoever put this video together spent more time on the pounding music and the insertion of video clips of horseman and others running down migrants and displaying Gosar’s supposedly noble visage than they did on the short anime segment that has made so much news. This video is a shoutout to the violent extremists of the right wing, conveniently wrapped in a package meant to make it excusable as “silly”. In that way it parallels insignia like the Hawaiian shirts of the Boogaloo Bois.
If McMorris Rodgers voted Nay to censuring Rep. Goser without reviewing the video, then shame on her for blindly following reports of it like the writing at the Gateway Pundit. If she voted Nay after watching the video then shame on her for indicating that she believes this is acceptable conduct for a member of Congress. We deserve better representation.
Keep to the high ground,
Jerry