Waffle House of Representatives

Our ruling elites are our reflection

I haven’t laughed this hard since the last time I watched an Arrested Development episode.

ICYMI, our beloved US Representatives AOC, MTG, and someone I hadn’t heard of before, Jasmine Crockett, had a catfight during the most recent House Oversight Committee meeting. The video is 3 minutes long, but I want to share portions of the transcript, with the juiciest parts in italics:

Do you know what we're here for? You know we're here about AG. I don't think you know what you're here for. Well, you don't want us talking about, I guess you feel something's wrong. I think your fake eyelashes are messing up with you. No, ain't nothing. Hold on, hold on. Order, Mr. Chairman. That's beneath even you, Ms. Green. Would you please regain order of your committee? I do have a point of order, and I would like to move to take down Ms. Green's words. That is.

Absolutely unacceptable. How dare you?

Are your feelings hurt now?

Oh girl baby girl Oh really don't even play baby girl.

You're not yeah, you're not you don't have enough intelligence

It's me. Ms. Crockett. I'm just curious, just to better understand your ruling, if someone on this committee then starts talking about somebody's bleach-blind, bad-built, butch body, that would not be engaging in personalities, correct?

A what now? I had no idea what you just said. We're not going to do this. Look, you guys.

Earlier literally just voted to do it. You just voted to do it. Order, order. I'm trying to get clarification.

Lookit, calm down. Calm down.

No, no, no, because this is what y'all do. So I'm trying to get clarification.

Hey, Ms. Crockett, you're not recognized. Ms. Crockett. I can't hear you with your yelling. Calm down.

No, don't tell me to calm down. Calm down. Because y'all talk noise and then you can't take it.

You're out of control.

Look, Chairman, can we send her off trying to take a break for five minutes? Mr. Chairman, Mr. Chairman. Order.

You couldn’t write a better comedy sketch than what played out IRL in our esteemed national legislature; it’s giving Bon Qui Qui, or that viral chair-throwing Waffle House brawl.

Appreciate for a moment the fact that a 34 year old sitting member of the House of Reps called a fellow Congresswoman 25 years her senior “baby girl” and told her “don’t play”. Moments later, another Representative, 43-year-old Ms. Crockett, began spitting bars as insults, later tweeting she was like “the Kendrick Lamar of Congress”.

These aren’t serious people, yet they’re in a serious position of power and influence, acting like middle schoolers. They represent us?

Clearly, they do. This is unfortunately accurate. The use of Zoomer slang on the House floor by elected officials way too old for such language or behavior is fitting for the modern American people. We get the rulers we deserve. If it looks like an episode of The Real Housewives, it’s because it basically is. Americans act like this every day, so how can we expect anything better from the people we elect to represent us? Grainy iPhone clips pop up on Instagram Reels and TikTok showing ordinary people breaking into hysterics over chicken wings, craft store merchandise, Sephora cosmetics. It’s shocking when it’s average Americans; it’s comical when it’s our aristocratic class.

This points to a deeper truth: the powerbrokers in society are supposed to be better than us. The reason some make it to the upper echelons and others don’t is, in theory, because they are better educated, better qualified, more rational, better at working with others, than the hoi polloi. Our statesmen and stateswomen were meant to be the best of us. Sadly, our uppercrust is no better than the rest of us. In fact, this makes them worse than us (in a way), because they really should be capable of behaving better. If Karen bitches out the local Starbucks barista or Latisha throws a tempter tantrum over her fries being cold, no one bats an eye; we assume they’re not capable of much better, because they’re not trained in statecraft, Aristotle’s highest calling.

The hallmark of rulers versus ruled, governors versus governed, is that they take on the responsibility and burden of putting aside pettiness for the sake of the common good. If they can’t do that - if our country’s being run by Karens and Latishas - then we need a complete and total replacement of the elite class with people superior in quality to the cast of Jersey Shore.