Come on, and make me, I dare you. . . You little fruitcake!

[astro]

It’s those lazy, hazy days of summer again and the congressmen are restless.

From the Washington Post

The House That Roared - In Ways and Means Brawl, Names, Police and Sergeant at Arms Are Called

Even before Thomas gaveled the reading to an end, he had dispatched the Capitol Police to remove the Democrats from the ornate library. Two officers arrived and, realizing they wanted no part of arresting House members for milling in a library, called a watch commander.

The commander gently assured the Democrats – by now playing to the news cameras and loudly demanding to know whether they were under arrest – that no one would be handcuffed or evicted. In fact, the three officers decided, this was a matter for the House Sergeant at Arms, not the police.

A Sergeant at Arms official soon settled the matter: No security officers would take action in “a committee matter,” he announced. The Democrats, realizing they had played the scene for all it was worth, departed for the House chamber, where their contretemps resumed ----------------------

Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) introduced a resolution protesting the GOP’s behavior, triggering an afternoon-long debate in which each side accused the other of debasing Congress. Democrats charged that Republicans were running “a police state,” with Pelosi saying her colleagues had suffered “an indignity no member should be expected to endure.”

Republicans recounted indignities of their own: When Rep. Scott McInnis (R-Colo.) had told Stark to “shut up” during the committee meeting, Stark denounced him as “a little wimp. Come on, come over here and make me, I dare you. . . . You little fruitcake. You little fruitcake. I said you are a fruitcake.”

Democrats said the GOP simply wanted to change the subject, since Thomas had summoned the police before Stark lit into McInnis. Thomas neither answered reporters’ questions nor appeared on the House floor yesterday, letting Rep. Jim McCrery (R-La.) counter Democratic charges.

[jjimm]

Pit thread on the same amusing subject.