Paul Gosar is the male Marjorie Taylor-Greene, the quieter Jim Jordan, and the racist equivalent of Steven King.
The MAGA representative from Arizona openly spoke at a white nationalist rally, though he left most of the overt racism to the man who invited him and spoke to him personally throughout. Gosar’s presence said everything needed. Paul Gosar is also Paul Gosar D.D.S., and from a report read a week ago, was a damned good dentist, loved by his patients. Ten years ago, he changed, almost overnight, like he found a new and very unhealthy outlet. He went into politics, and not for the right reasons.
He joined a cult that was just forming.
Sometimes families can reach out and create a moment of clarity for a loved one. Interventions work for a reason. No one feels compelled to give up harmful behaviors if one feels alone. Today, Paul Gosar’s siblings wrote a scathing column on NBC.com [1] calling on him to resign due to the recent stories connecting Gosar to January 6th*
(*This is an interesting development because we watch reports closely and haven’t seen anything yet that links Gosar even closer to January 6th beyond what we’ve read. It is possible that his family knows more than the public).
The siblings mention the famous line that ended the McCarthy hearings, “Have you no shame,” and wrote from there:
We now ask our brother, Rep. Paul Gosar, that same question. Although his colleagues in Congress [2] and others in the media [3]seem to only recently be paying attention, we have been aware of his unhinged behavior for years. [4] We are therefore not surprised to see him heading down a very similar path to McCarthy’s.
Perhaps the most damning words in that paragraph? “Not surprised.”
Then they go on to list his many sins, also very similar to an intervention, going over all the people he’s hurt and the shameful things done. In this particular intervention, the drug is power, and acceptance by “the one.”
And this is just the start of our list, which includes so many other examples, from your decision to lobby for John McCain’s Senate seat while he was still alive to supporting the Senate run of Roy Moore [5], who was accused of sexual misconduct with teenagers when he was in his 30s. (Moore has denied the allegations [6].)
They move on, revisiting a lot of his sins in the name of MAGA, and then veer off course from the classic intervention speech, by essentially telling him it is too late. With respect to someone who really needs an intervention in cults, for substance abuse, codependency, whatever it might be, one always gives the person intervened hope because there is always hope. Some of the most beautiful people you will beet are prisoners in their 15th year of a 25-year sentence, people learn, people change, people evolve. There is always hope.
But not so much for Gosar, unless he rejects his cult and quits:
The extremism of your beliefs is finally getting the media attention it deserves. What should happen now is that you resign. Sadly, this seems unlikely. This means unless your colleagues step in, you are likely doomed to go down in history as a cautionary tale: a person who betrayed his family, his country and even himself.
Ultimately, the first victim of the big lies — the lies you have always told yourself to justify anything you do, always for your benefit and at the expense of others — is really you.
We have nothing to add. Even though Gosar is part of our government and, in that sense, family, we cannot match what was just laid out. In many ways, it is too late for Gosar to undo all he’s done but he’s still alive. He can take steps to do better and sometimes that’s all one needs.
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