Louie Gohmert is outraged by arrogant Democrats on step-ladders who say he enables kid killings

‘The lady doth protest too much, methinks.’ — William Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act 3, Scene 2

Before there was Boebert, there was Gohmert. In 2005, this OG idiot arrived in DC and set a new standard for stupidity in the US Congress. Now his time is drawing to a close as this towering figure of intellectual deprivation is hanging up his spurs. He retired from Congress so he could run for Texas Attorney General. But with just 17% of the primary vote, he failed to make the Republican runoff. And the sunset beckons.

He is not leaving quietly.

On Thursday, when Rep Eric Swalwell (D-CA) asked the Republican Representatives standing in the way of any action to reduce gun deaths, “Are you here for our kids, or are you here for the killers?” Gohmert acted like a toddler caught using magic markers on the furniture. He yelled, protested his innocence, and lied through his teeth. Over Zoom, he addressed the accusations and oratorically threw up on himself. His words,  

“I don’t think it is very effective for children to have people on the other side of the aisle come in and accuse Republicans of being complicit in murder. And that we put our right to kill over others' right to live. To infer by supposed rhetorical questions, “Who are you here for? We must be here for the gunman”, is an outrage. How dare you? Do you think we don’t have hearts?

I will answer his last question first. No, I do not think Gohmert has a heart. Judging by his actions, he is one of the gun lobby’s compassion-free, lap dogs who lack a shred of concern for kids. And he has put his right to kill over others’ right to live. And lastly, Swalwell did not “infer”, he “implied”. People who think English ought to be the official language of the US should learn it.

Next, Gohmert tried a tired deflection. Cities have high murder rates. Democrats control cities. Ergo, Democrats are bad on gun violence.  

“It’s just that when we look at the things you’re doing And the things you’re trying to do to America. We have seen the carnage. I mean for heaven's sakes. We’ve seen the example. Democrats control the major cities that have the worst murder rates. That’s right. Your ideas have been shown to get people killed.”

He mentions Chicago and Philadelphia. But what he did not address is where Chicago gang-bangers get their guns? The answer is from states with slack gun laws. He also fails to mention the high murder rate in cities with Republican Mayors — such as Miami, Jacksonville, Oklahoma City, Tulsa, Fort Worth, and Stockton. Nor does he mention that the states with the highest murder rates are overwhelmingly red.

Most damningly, he ignores that it is the Uvalde school massacre that has inspired the current push for gun control. And Uvalde is in the gun-crazy Texas - Gohmert's home state.

Gohmert then insisted he is a good man,

“We care about people. We care about their lives. And lives have been so trivialized. We care deeply. How dare you? How dare you, you arrogant people? Attributing murder to those of us that want to do things to stop it. Because we’ve seen what your ideas do. They create more murder. If you could just possibly get off any arrogant step ladder that allows you to look down on us.”

It is a truism that people who boast of being good, intelligent, expert, moral, or any other positive attribute are never that thing. Louie could not sound more like a man with a guilty conscience if he tried. And what has Gohmert done to “stop it”? What single act could he point to that has saved a life?

Then Gohmert made things up.  

Thomas Jefferson was not at the constitutional convention. But he said in a letter, if I could change one thing, it would be to require bills be on file for a year before they are voted on. Because he understood the mistakes that are made when you rush to make big decisions out of emotion. That’s what we’re trying to prevent so that we can save lives. And keep people from being killed, for heaven's sake.

When a Republican attributes something to a Founder, it is most likely a fabrication. But I gave Gohmert the benefit of the doubt and googled his Jefferson claim. I got nothing. Perhaps there is a letter somewhere that says it — I have by no means read all of Jefferson’s letters. But I have read “A Manual of Parliamentary Practice for the Use of the Senate of the United States”. This guide was based on the distillation of parliamentary history and practice Jefferson had learned at William and Mary and considered as Vice-President and presiding officer of the Senate. The House also adopted it.

Nowhere in its over 200 pages, covering 53 topics — from (1) The importance of following rules to (53) Impeachment — does Jefferson talk about delaying Bills to let them ‘mature’.

Then Gohmert offers his solution — prayer. Why? Probably because it does not cost anything and takes little effort. And conservatives, like other insane people, are not deterred by serial failure.

I think back historically. We had a President in Franklin Roosevelt that on D-Day led the country in a 6 to 8-minute prayer for our troops. And now we have a President who came on after Uvalde and he used God’s name in vain As most of us would consider it. It was used as an interjection not as a source to be for wisdom like our country did for most of our history.

Dear God, Gohmert is more concerned about God’s name than he is about the massacre of 19 children and two teachers.

Gohmert sticks his landing with a sneer at liberals and a thinly disguised racist swipe at the Supreme Court’s civil rights decisions.

“Since the 60s we really started having these mass shootings. Perhaps there was something in the 60s maybe some Supreme Court decisions. They gave rise to people being taught in schools that whatever you think feels good. Well, it’s time to get common sense back.”

If Gohmert wants to understand the truth of gun massacres in the US, he must do better than his failed stab at sociology. He should look at the devastation of pro-gun deregulation and the increasing ease with which angry young men, and disgruntled older men, can buy high-powered weapons with jumbo clips and devastating ammunition.

And Gohmert lecturing on common sense is like a mole rat lecturing on astronomy.

Here’s the full rant: