The Republicans at least have some genuine plebs in their ranks: Q-Anon kook Lauren Boebert was a knocked-up high-school dropout who started a Hooters knockoff that eventually went bust after losing its lease — because there is nothing that screams “Real America!” like fake Hooters. Her foundational political document is the Rifle Rodeo food-poisoning-outbreak report. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a different Q-Anon kook, was a CrossFit instructor until she became obsessed with conspiracy websites, which are now the road to Congress for Republicans. Not going to get prolier-than-thou with that bunch. There are still some classic Republicans out there, like the Trump-endorsed nut in Michigan who got canned by his law firm when his employers accused him of padding his billing, which is some old-school, Alex P. Keaton-type Republican stuff.

So, maybe it’s class. Maybe it’s something in the water. Maybe it’s just bad luck.

Or maybe it is evolution in reverse: Consider the Senate seat from New York currently held by Kirsten Gillibrand. Before Gillibrand, the seat was held by Hillary Rodham Clinton, who is not exactly Cincinnatus, but before Clinton, it was held by Daniel Patrick Moynihan, a genuinely interesting and intelligent contributor to American life; trace it back from Moynihan and you get James Buckley (“the sainted junior senator from New York”), Bobby Kennedy, and, if you go far enough, Gouverneur Morris. Some scoundrels and rat-bastards in that bunch, to be sure, but many welcome breaks from the insipidity of Senator Gillibrand. Kyrsten Sinema’s seat once was held by Barry Goldwater. Senator Warren’s predecessors include John Kennedy, Henry Cabot Lodge, Charles Sumner, Daniel Webster, and John Quincy Adams — Hyperions to a Birkenstock. The Impossible Burger guys could whip up a more convincing senator in their mad-vegan-scientist lab.