Judge Jeanine Pirro, currently a host on Fox News, is calling for House Speaker Paul Ryan to resign following the failure to repeal and replace the ACA. Considering the difficulty the Republicans had in coming up with a consensus Speaker in the first place and the concessions Ryan got to accept the job, is there any member of Congress that would be suitable to the vast majority of House Republicans.
Remember, House officers are chosen by the entire House, not just by the majority party, so if enough Republicans vote for a different candidate, the Democrats can join them and really muck up the works. (I don’t know if that ever happened is the US Congress – it happened once here in the Missouri legislature way back in the early 80s I believe.)
I have no idea who might be acceptable. Anyone want to take a stab at this?
It seems to me that the Republican Party has a hard time balancing the wants of their party with the actual wants of the base. The base seems to be easy to rally, but, like this health care turd they tried to pass, when it comes time to actually do the deed, they have trouble getting it done. Is there actually anyone that would be better than Ryan from their point of view?
I have no idea. I think nobody wants the job. Even Ryan had to be persuaded to take it, and it was a lot easier then than it is now. Can you imagine wanting to be in a nominal position of leadership as Trump screws up all your plans?
The structural problems that make the Speaker weak aren’t going anywhere, and who wants to be associated with the stench of failure?
Is there anyone saying, “Let’s ignore the Freedom Caucus and just focus on doing a competent job of governing instead of playing politics like a sports game”?
I’d like Susan Collins to be it, but given her anti-Trump stance, that’d probably just bring the government to a halt. Anyone else that just wants to do the job, honestly?
There are 217 non-Freedom Caucus Republicans in the house, and it takes 218 votes to pass a bill. They either need at least one Freedom Caucus member to vote with them, or they need to get a Democrat to do so.
The former is probably easier, both because their most ardent constituents think that compromise is failure, and because a deal on any contentious issue that convinces Democrats to vote for it is probably going to lose some more conservative non-Freedom Caucus votes anyway. And then you need more Democrats.
Hard to do a competent job governing when you can’t cobble together a majority of votes.
Remember, no requirement that the speaker be a member of the House, although it seems unlikely that anyone not a member would actually get the job (or want it).
I wonder if the Senate has a rule against a Senator being the Speaker? If so, it’s probably a more general rule about positions outside the Senate.
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