Uh oh, the monstrous regiment of women.

In Michigan, women hold power. Not everyone seems comfortable with that.

The chairman of the Michigan Republican Party called three top statewide elected officials “witches” in a speech last week. He said he wanted to “soften up” the women — Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, Attorney General Dana Nessel and Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson —  so when he had GOP candidates to run against them, they’re “ready for the burning at the stake.”

Well at least he didn’t call them cunts. Progress?

Weeks earlier, the state’s Senate majority leader said of Whitmer that the party had “spanked her hard on the budget, spanked her hard on appointments.”

In December, another state senator said Whitmer was “neutering” lawmakers. He had described two women colleagues’ words as “shrill outrage” months earlier.

Anxiety much?

“Misogyny does happen, subtly and blatantly,” said Democratic state Sen. Erika Geiss, one of the women described by a male lawmaker as having “shrill outrage” when she made a statement on the Senate floor last May about partisanship. “It is problematic, and it has been problematic for years.”

For as long as women have had any power, would be my guess.

Ron Weiser, the chairman of the Michigan Republican Party, apologized Saturday for his “witches”  remarks made late last month. 

Soraya Chemaly, the author of the 2018 book “Rage Becomes Her: The Power of Women’s Anger,” said Weiser was using gender stereotypes ”to depict women with power as unnatural, as irrational.”

Chemaly drew a line from the man captured in a photo with his feet on a desk in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office during the Capitol insurrection to what’s happened to Whitmer.

“The thought that a woman can have this power over men is really hard for many people. It’s particularly hard for conservative men,” she said.

Naturally enough, since many of them don’t even believe in the principle, let alone the practice.