SCOTT LUDWIG: I know you are, but what am I?

When I was growing up, it was a common practice to call someone – particularly someone you didn’t especially care for – a name. Then, regardless of what you called the other person – dummy, doofus, mama’s boy – they would respond “I know you are, but what am I?”

OK, so it wasn’t the wittiest comeback of all time, but it came in handy when no other option was available because the person was in fact a dummy, doofus, or mama’s boy. What reminded me of this, something I hadn’t thought about since before my voice broke, is the appearance of Attorney General Pam Bondi before the House Judiciary Committee on Feb. 11.

As for the purpose of the assembly, I’ll just say that your guess is as good as mine. It’s one thing that she avoided answering the critical questions posed to her: How many co- conspirators of Jeffrey Epstein has she indicted, did she have knowledge of Donald Trump at parties with underage girls, who approved the transfer of convicted sex offender Ghislaine Maxwell from prison to one with more comfortable living conditions, were various members of the Cabinet questioned about their ties to Epstein, etc.?

But it’s another thing altogether that Bondi used her time to attack the members of Congress charged with holding her to account. It was clear from the start that she didn’t want any part of it and would have preferred to be somewhere – anywhere – else.

Throughout her “testimony,” she lashed out, attacked, pointed fingers, changed the subject, pleaded ignorance, tossed out insults, and remained silent when she knew her back was against the wall.

In short, she said or did anything she could think of to save her skin. A few of the lowlights including Bondi asking Democrats if they apologized to Trump for participating in his impeachment hearings, boasting about the performance of the stock market, calling Jamie Raskin, D, Maryland, a “washed-up lawyer,” accusing Hank Johnson, D, Georgia, of lacking experience (despite being in Congress for two decades), and saying Thomas Massie, R, Kentucky, has “Trump derangement syndrome.”

And these are just the tip of a very, very deep iceberg. You’ll find these – and many more – on the internet. In one of the more cringe-worthy moments, Pramila Jayapal, D, Washington, asked Bondi if she would turn and face the Epstein survivors (who were standing at the back of the room) and apologize for what Bondi’s Department of Justice was putting them through with the unacceptable release of the Epstein files and the information they contained.

Bondi didn’t budge or even so much as blink. All she had to say was, “I’m not going to get into the gutter with this woman and doing (sic) theatrics.” With that, Jayapal asked the Epstein survivors to raise their hand if they had not yet been invited to meet with Bondi or the DOJ. Every single one of them held their hand in the air.

Jasmine Crockett, D, Texas, may have said it best when she looked directly at Bondi and said, “I completely don’t get how it is that you’re sitting at the top of DOJ because you don’t seem to be good at your job.”

Perhaps understated, but it still hit the nail on a very hard head.

So to you directly, Ms. Bondi, do you know what comes to mind when I think about your day in court, if you want to call it that? Loathsome. Petty. Hateful. Vengeful. Defensive. Obtrusive. Belligerent. Spiteful. Contemptible.

In fact, I noticed that when you became exceptionally flummoxed, as Thomas Massie so eloquently pointed out, you resorted to using a binder full of negative information prepared by your staff about various members of Congress that you couldn’t memorize and therefore had to shuffle through them to find the flash-cards-insult that matches the member.

Certainly any one of those adjectives – loathsome, petty, hateful, vengeful, defensive, obtrusive, belligerent, spiteful, contemptible — fit the bill to describe your shameful performance. But if I were to return to my adolescence to insult you, Ms. Bondi, I’d probably go with this: You’re an embarrassment.

And there’s no need to respond, Ms. AG, because I already know what you would say. The same thing Herbert Dean said 60 years ago when I called him a mama’s boy.