It is a rare day I agree with any WSJ editorial but I think they are correct on this one. Although, it may be better if republicans can’t get their act together. Still, surprised to see the WSJ break ranks with conservatives and publicly call them out.
Their main demand is so self-defeating it could have come from Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. The dissenters want Mr. McCarthy to concede that any Member could call the chair vacant and insist on a vote to replace the sitting Speaker. In order to get the votes to become Speaker, Mr. McCarthy is supposed to weaken himself so much that he wouldn’t be able to govern as Speaker.
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Meanwhile, across the Capitol, Senate Republicans are doing Mr. McCarthy no favors by joining Democrats to pass a giant omnibus spending bill for fiscal 2023. Most House Republicans prefer a continuing resolution to fund the government only into early next year, when Republicans will have more leverage as the House majority.
But Mitch McConnell and the Senate GOP don’t trust that Mr. McCarthy can deliver in January, or so they say. They won’t even give him the chance.
Yes. They bought and paid for the R party a long time ago. They’re desperately afraid the party may not stay bought. Trump was funny at first. Now, 6 years later, they’ve woken up to the real risk they’re running. Not just from Trump himself, but from Southern fried populist know-nothingness & Russian backed authoritarianism.
They are facing the bill coming due on their failure of imagination when buying the R party and the strategies to garner power by appealing to reactionary populism, without considering what happens if enough Know-Nothings find themselves in the position to actually exert power, and decide to exert it (maybe that just was looked at with hubris, assuming they naturally would always easily keep the Know-Nothings on a leash).
Were they ever doing the bidding of those in power? ISTM Trumpers were off the rails from Day #1. Then we get the likes of Boebert and Taylor Greene (as if Palin wasn’t a warning sign).
I guess I am wondering why now? What clued the WSJ in today that they could not perceive six years ago and realize the patients were running the asylum?
Six years ago they assumed.that Trump would be an easily controlled puppet who’d sign all the taxcutting, regulation destroying bills their Congressional minions laid before him, would keep the rabble entertained and easily led, and would stay out of their way and let the Right People.actually run things the Right Way.
Instead they got a chaos goblin who encouraged all.the nutcases to let their freak.flags fly.
True, that, @Chronos. Anyone see the NYTimes piece on newly elected representative George Santos? Apparently his whole biography, including current living address, is a fraud.
A grifter latching onto grifters to grift the easily grifted. And he did this via becoming a member of Congress.
Impresses me as yet more capitalist short-term thinking.
Focus on maximizing your immediate profit, whatever the predictable long term costs. Later you can try to adapt to whatever damage your greed brought about.
Part of the problem, as I see it, was that Republicans kept moving the goalposts on Trump. When he was first elected they would say “well, if he tries X, that’s where we draw the line.” Then Trump would not just step over that line, he was like Bob Beamon in the long jump at the '68 Olympics. So then Republicans would shift and say "well, if he does Y, then that’s where we draw the line. Again, Bob Beamon. Pretty soon those goalposts were on rails, they were being moved so often. The current state of the GOP is exactly what happens when you don’t hold leadership accountable. And even after January 6th and a second impeachment, they still lined up right behind him instead of doing what they needed to do. Because when it comes right down to it, Republicans are craven cowards.
This article is almost unbelievable. There is nothing about this guy that is real – employment history, background, education, home address. It’s really not clear where he got all his money from, either – just a few years ago, he was being evicted for not paying his rent, and now he’s lending his campaign $700k.
Exactly. They did not particularly “like” him but if he was what the rabble wanted, let them have him and tell him to let the grownups run things.
This was a major Failure Of Imagination in that they did not consider what would happen if at some point these putative puppets would figure: “Wait… people have to obey if I give orders? And I am insulated from consequences?”
I remember the Republicans saying that the only thing they cared about was him having enough working digits to sign whatever they put in front of him. Little did they know that instead of a bumbling fool they had put a fascist in office.
Poor little McCarthy. He spends six years licking Donald’s boots, prostituting and humiliating himself all so he could have a chance to be Speaker. And now his majority is so slim that even if he gets the votes now, he won’t have them for long. I’d feel sorry for him, if he had an ounce of integrity or was a good person. But he has none and is not a good person, so whatever comeuppance he gets is truly well earned.
What will this new majority do? We already know, investigate Hunter Biden. Want plans, want a vision, want solutions? Look elsewhere, Republicans don’t do that any more.