The first day Congress was in session after the Orlando Pulse nightclub massacre, Paul Ryan attempted to hold a moment of silence to honor the victims. Numerous Democrats walked out of the moment of silence in protest. See, according to them, a moment of silence was a stupid, empty gesture they weren’t willing to be part of. They weren’t going to involve themselves in this kind of political showmanship anymore. Either pass a bill or GTFO, they said. Don’t insult the memories of the fallen with these empty gestures.

Fast forward to this week. Now at last, Democrats are going to do something. What, specifically are they going to do? Well, they’re going to sit on the plush carpet of the House chamber. While they are there, they are going to send a whole crapton of fundraising emails. Food will be catered in to them. They will post pictures of themselves looking super cereal while sitting on the floor on social media. When an opportunity came for them to force a vote on a gun control measure, they rejected it instead so that they could, you know, raise more “awareness.” And money. Especially money.

So at the end of the day, this sit-in accomplished a vote on exactly zero bills. It did help the Democrats pad their campaign bank accounts. It also got them a ton of media coverage looking important and “standing up for the right thing.” And then… oh, crap, the weekend is coming up, and we really need to get back home and fundraise some more, so let’s shut the whole thing down.

So how do these brave Democrats, who boldly rejected the empty symbolism of a moment of silence to honor the Orlando victims, wish to characterize their efforts, which accomplished exactly zero votes and zero passed bills?

The talk is that Democrats decided its best to declare victory on their sit-in and resume thier effort after July 4th

— Kelly O’Donnell (@KellyO) June 23, 2016

It is to laugh. The Democrats could be systematically destroying the Republicans right now, with all the damage that is being done to the GOP brand by Trump. Really all they would have to do would be do nothing at all, but they simply cannot help themselves when it comes to looking like clowns.