In this case it's not a politician, it's a senator. In the way a Supreme Court Justice is not just a lawyer. We're talking about one of the most powerful members of the reigning political party making jokes about deploying troops against its own lawmakers. That's too screwed up to say carelessly, and too common place to be considered absurd. Even a joke tests the waters. General McChrystal was dismissed for much less, simply because he jokingly underminded the authority of the president. If he were to have joked about taking troops into DC to seize control of the government, he would probably be sitting in Ft. Leavenworth right now.