John Krull, publisher, TheStatehouseFile.com

During a committee hearing, U.S. Sen. Markwayne Mullin, R-Oklahoma, challenged a witness—Teamsters President Sean O’Brien—to a fight. The senator ordered O’Brien to “stand your butt up” while taking off his rings and leaving his chair.

The committee’s 82-year-old chairman, U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vermont, had to intervene and restore both peace and the dignity of what once was called the world’s greatest deliberative body.

“You’re a United States senator,” Sanders said plaintively while Mullin was showing off the conflict-resolution skills of a six-year-old.

Afterward, Mullin said he wanted to throw down with O’Brien because he thought the people of Oklahoma would want that—brainless brawling—rather than, say, leadership, statesmanship and thought. You know, the qualities people in high offices with important responsibilities normally are expected to exhibit.

At almost the same time that Mullin was working to de-dignify and dumb down the Senate, U.S. Rep. Kevin McCarthy, R-California—until not long ago the speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives—apparently elbowed U.S. Rep. Tim Burchett, R-Tennessee, in the kidneys while Burchett’s back was turned.

There’s bad blood between the two.

Burchett supplied one of the eight Republican votes that moved McCarthy from being House speaker to being a former House speaker.

After the incident, McCarthy said he did not intentionally elbow Burchett—although there were witnesses who said he did—and then boasted that normally when he hits someone the person being hit knows it.

Lord, help me.

Where do we find these people?

Much already has been made of the sheer idiocy and immaturity of these moments and—we’ll be generous here—men.

All those criticisms are valid.

McCarthy is 58. Mullin is 46.

By the calendar, then, they’re adults, grown men.

Their actions, though, indicate otherwise. One of the qualities of maturity—of manhood—is mastering one’s emotions, particularly one’s temper.

Real men have the emotional discipline to resist provocation. Their egos are not so fragile that they lash out physically when they’ve been insulted or offended. They understand that violence is justifiable only when someone is in danger of physical harm.

If their sense of manhood can be undermined, wounded or threatened by a joke, taunt or setback, well, then their sense of themselves as men can’t be that secure.

But this focus on the puerile immaturity involved in these incidents obscures another aspect that should be considered.

The sheer cowardice.

Both Mullin and McCarthy want their followers to think of them as tough guys. That’s why Mullin engaged in his macho posturing in a Senate committee room and McCarthy bragged afterward about how hard he can hit people.

But they’re not tough guys.

Not by a long shot.

McCarthy struck Burchett from behind while Burchett’s attention was focused on a reporter who was interviewing him. Even a schoolboy knows—as Burchett pointed out afterward in describing the incident—there’s nothing brave or tough about striking someone from behind.

And Mullin?

Give me a break.

He demanded that O’Brien mix it up with him in a room under the protection of the Capitol Police. If Mullins’ pro-wrestling like preening had resulted in fisticuffs and O’Brien had gotten the upper hand, the cops would have stepped in to stop the teamster from stomping his opponent into the marble floor faster than a referee could count to 10.

Because the police remember something that Mullin apparently doesn’t—that he is a United States senator and cops have a duty to protect that office, even if it’s a sense of duty the senator himself doesn’t share.

If McCarthy and Mullin wanted to see what true toughness looks like, they wouldn’t have to go far to find sterling examples.

Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-California, and former U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyoming, both often have demonstrated remarkable grace under immense pressure.

Even when they have been threatened with harm or death, they always have maintained their composure. They both have been relentless in meeting the duties of their offices and their responsibilities to the American people.

And they did it without taking cheap shots, ala McCarthy, or starting fights they knew they wouldn’t have to finish, ala Mullin.

In other words, Pelosi and Cheney acted like adults and leaders even under intense provocation to do otherwise.

That takes discipline.

That takes courage.

That takes toughness.

John Krull is director of Franklin College’s Pulliam School of Journalism and publisher of TheStatehouseFile.com, a news website powered by Franklin College journalism students. The views expressed are those of the author only and should not be attributed to Franklin College.