I'm sure this New York Times headline is offered in good faith, but it's just wrong:
This is your periodic reminder that it's Kevin McCarthy who has sown "mass dysfunction," not the small and powerless House Freedom Caucus. McCarthy can sideline them anytime he wants by following the Senate's lead and working on a bipartisan basis in the House. If he did that, he'd get 300 votes instantly for a continuing resolution to keep the government open and probably the same number of votes for a budget based on the deal he made during the debt ceiling showdown.
But he doesn't want to. He wants to work exclusively within the Republican caucus, where he has a razor-thin majority, and this is what gives hardliners their power even though their numbers are tiny.
In the Senate, Chuck Schumer worked with Republicans to pass a budget. If McCarthy worked with Democrats in the House he'd quickly leave the Freedom Caucus howling fruitlessly into the wind as everyone else ignores their antics and gets some work done. He can do it anytime he wants.
I wonder how many votes McCarthy could get to expel Greene and Gaetz.
I'd pay to watch that roll call vote.
Don't forget Boebert. Though I believe they've each excommunicated each other.
By the same reasoning, a very small number of "moderate" Republicans can come to an agreement with the Democrats, sideline McCarthy, and pass whatever they can agree to. But they don't. Because, just like McCarthy, they're afraid of the Freedom Caucus radicals. It is not all due to McCarthy. The entire Republican caucus is the problem here.
+1.
Side note: The NYT should get points for not using "conservatives" to refer to the crackpots.
Absolutely true. I think a deal with Democrats would be entirely doable. Fund at or above the level agreed to in the debt-ceiling negotiations, no poison-pill culture-war bullshit; enough Dems vote ‘No’ on vacating the Speaker’s office. But the chickenshit Republican ‘mainstream’ won’t do it, for fear of primary challenges from neo-Confederates. And regardless, some of the GOP ’moderates’ will be defeated by Dems in the general election anyway, because of the shutdown and Dobbs.
But only if they’re willing to face a primary challenge from the far-right that they’re very likely not going to survive. And that’s the fundamental problem. It’s basically “one vote, one time” to do the right thing and then your cushy job as a congress-critter is gone and you’ve got to go out and find a real job with comparable pay and benefits—which is likely impossible.
As long as the MAGA crowd is willing to seemingly give up power they’ll continue to be the ultimate power in the Republican Party and, very likely in short order, in the entire country.
I don't think they can do that by the rule of the House: the Speaker controls what legislation comes up for a vote, unless they vacate McCarthy and those same "moderate" Republicans vote Jeffries or one of their number in as Speaker. As noted, they would be committing political (and perhaps real) suicide as they'd be pilloried AND primaried in a second. Maybe even get recalled if their states provide for such a thing.
The could sign the discharge petition for a continuing resolution. If a majority of House members sign, the bill must be allowed to come to the floor. There are some specific rules to it, but that's the essence. The Democrats have already signed.
No member of the majority signs on, because it's a career ender. It's not just that they'd be primaried and lose, but the leadership would freeze them out.
I believe the desired continuing resolution includes additional money for Ukraine, Maui fire etcc: so, in reality, its slightly more complicated that Kevin implies...
Well, duh!
The problem is that McCarthy has this absolute desire to be speaker. So he made concessions to the loonies to get them to vote for him. And gave all tools of control out of his hands.
Now he has two choices: Do the right thing and lose his job* or keep pandering to the crazy caucus.
* He might well get it back as nobody else is willing (or able in most cases) to do the job with the restrictions imposed by Gaetz et al. But this is too much of a gamble for poor Kevin...
The Speaker is voted on by the entire House, so Kevin could make a deal with the Democrats to preserve his speakership too. Granted, he'd then be primaried and probably lose his seat...but that's for another day.
Any "deal" by McCarthy would likely be broken by further (and unending) demands from the Dumb and Dumberer folks. Also, in recent decades, Republicans have not been known to be honest brokers. You can't count on them to honor agreements that they make. They've already broken the government shutdown agreement they made just a few months ago!
Finally, why would Democrats want to prop up and support a feckless and cowardly man whose only interest in life seems to be keeping Nancy Pelosi's big fancy office? And is at the total mercy of the crazies for it?
Because the House would be even more useless if it had to take 279 votes for a successor Speaker?
At this point, the Democrats would have to be crazy to rescue Trump’s speaker and the MAGA wing of the Republican Party. Let them take endless votes for the speakership.
It is not "rescuing them". Democrats voting for McCarthy will cause the Republican party to go into a meltdown, unless McCarthy immediately resign, in which case nothing have changed.
It seems unlikely that the Big Ag voters in Bakersfield would vote to oust McCarthy. They’re Californians, not hillbillies.
The second McCarthy did that, however, he'd be out as speaker. So he's in a bit of a quandary, you see. He has absolutely no leverage with these nutjobs and they have absolutely no worries about being punished by their consituents, who, if anything, are even crazier than they are.
Bingo. I'm surprised nobody else has brought this up. Part of Qevin's deal with the Dumb and Dumberers was that any one of them could dethrone him at any time. And he really, really likes that big office: he even moved in, kicking out Nancy Pelosi, more than 15 votes prior to becoming Speaker.
It's not even quite that simple, because he could remain Speaker if he had the support of a substantial number of Democrats. But that would likely split his caucus into two warring camps and Democrats would end up the de facto majority party. Would McCarthy be willing to do that to keep his job? Who knows.
In most countries, the inability to pass a budget would result in the legislature being dissolved so new elections could be held. But thanks to yet another flaw in the US constitution, the country has to sit and suffer for up to two years no matter how dysfunctional the House turns out to be.
As opposed to voting/negotiating however many times it takes to produce a budget-passing or coalition-forming government.
And still ending up with Bibi.
I don't think I'm willing to call this good-faith.
If the political valence were reversed, and the Squad somehow managed to wedge up Jeffies between rules and his job security. I promise you Jeffies would not get the passive, whaddiya-gonna-do out he's handed there.
(And the Sqaddies wouldn't get out simply being called "left-wing", and anyway calling the FC "right-wing" is like calling burning thermite "warm".)
I don't know if I've been getting more sensitive to it or Editorial is getting worse, but I've been increasingly dissatisfied with the Time over the last decade. Even if I could put aside their nasty, calculated attacks on transfolk, they're not very subtle about propping up nasty authoritarians. They are going to have to earn my money back, I suspect some turnover will have to happen to flush the gross out. In any case, I refuse to feed them.
TL;DR summary:
Could McCarthy do bipartisanship? Nah. He's too much of a tool of the far-right. That's why we're headed for a shutdown.
Therein, of course, is why we're going to end up with the longest federal shutdown in history, IMO.
McCarthy's approach is the same as what he did to earn his speakership: Keep bringing up the same vote and make promises to be less bipartisan, until enough Republicans switch their vote.
"Rep. Tim Burchett is considering supporting a possible effort to oust House Speaker Kevin McCarthy if McCarthy makes a deal with Democrats as a way out of this week’s impending government shutdown." -- Politico
He's being pushed to be less bipartisan. This is all going to blow up in his face and the entire GOP.
I urge people to make this point that the far-right is pushing for less bipartisanship.
Agree it's not all the "wrecking ball caucus," but nor is it all Squeaker McQarthy.
There are a LOT of House Republicans who are hiding behind "oh we reeely reeely WANT to, but you see ... [insert excuse]."
But they DON'T want to, because they're scared sh!tless of being primaried and getting tossed out by the "wrecking ball caucus" in their own districts. Primaries skew extreme, and in all but the purplest of Republican districts, that's pretty extreme!
They're scared of the crazies and they're scared of the crazies' god-king, so they're hiding under their desks and meeping about following the Squeaker's lead and the Hastert Rule and blah blah blah.
As always, the problem is not exclusively or even mostly Republican politicians. It's Republican voters.
" It's Republican voters."
That assumes that "Republican voters" is a fixed entity. In a better working polity, the sane Republican politicians would drift towards the middle so they can win without the crazies. But they don't, mainly because of the primaries.
Transferrable voting may improve this situation, because it will make it easier for a "sane moderate Republican" to insert themselves between a Democrat and a crazy. Such a moderate may get many Democrat votes as second preference, so may actually win even in a very Right-wing tilted district.
But, as a practical matter, there’s been endless discussion about how the Republican Party should move more to the center (especially on immigration). We’ve seen what happens when this is just discussed. The nativist white supremacy movement goes nuts and, at the same time, makes actual movement towards the political center impossible. Remember, there’s already a deeply entrenched party of the center and center left and a limited number of well educated people to go around who would be interested in making common cause with what’s been a white Christian nationalist party.
Voting for a sane moderate Republican would not be the same as "making common cause" with anything, as long as this Republican is not worried about primary challange. Transferable vote make this easier.
At the moment there isn't such a thing as a "sane moderate Republican which is not worried about a primary" in the House, so make it difficult to see the point.
Correction - it's the Republican primary voters. Primaries draw out the truly committed voters, the voters who show up even it a hurricane is bearing down on them the next day. Primary voters (on both sides) tend to be the loudest, most dogmatic and hardest to win over. They care deeply about positions.
However, the Republicans have an even further unique problem of their own making. By gerrymandering the hell out of a lot of districts to keep them safely in Republican hands, they also left themselves open to primary attacks from the looniest of the loons. The ones the primary voters like. The most significant problem this creates is around abortion. Even if a given candidate wanted to find a saner middle ground, they can't because they'll be primaried by a crackpot running far to their right who's intent on banning birth control.
+1
Aaaand yet, the NON-primary voters (1) DON'T show up for their own primary and (2) show up for the general election and then vote for the candidate of the lunatics! So they bear responsibility too, first for evidently not caring enough about whom their party nominates, and second for going along when that nominee leans crazy.
IOW, the "other" Republican voters are enabling the craziness, both passively and actively. The problem is ALL Republican voters.
I was curious just how "blue" or "red" McCarthy's district might be. From the current map at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California%27s_20th_congressional_district that's one funky-looking district outline. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California%27s_20th_congressional_district#/media/File:California's_20th_congressional_district_(since_2023).svg
Wow! Qevin's district looks just like a groveling man!
How appropriate.
It’s the next phase of the trump coup d’etat. Shut down the government. Turn it into a total shit show. When the people gave control of the house to republicans, this is what they voted for. They want it burned down. If I were in trumps position, this is what I’d do too. Why would he want a functioning government in 2024?
“Elect me president and I will reopen the government.” Donald Trump.
People here say that McCarthy will be primaried if he "misbahve".
Is it actually obvious that McCarthy himself lose the primary if he starts to behave like an adult?
Well, there is an 800-pound orange gorilla in the background here who's both pulling some people's strings and holding out primary-election threats against potential cross-aisle cooperators. That seems somehow germane to me.
He Who Must Be Obeyed directly controls only a small handful, yes. But the biggest share of active grass-roots R party people are his acolytes and nobody who wants to keep a seat in the House is willing to go into a primary fight against that crowd, sicced on them because of an Orange Curse.
We are at a fundamental stage of Team Orange vs the United States. The surface contest is for the loyalty of the R party in Congress, and the short election cycle makes it most acute in the House. McCarthy is weak and feckless, yes, in spades. So would be any R speaker. This "Hastert Rule" stuff is involved, but it's not an explanation because the deeper contest is over the basic functioning of the US government.
It's as stark as it can get-- are you with DJT or are you with the USA? If you're with DJT you're for shutting the government down now and not giving in until he's protected-- he bleated that they have to stop the trials and investigations and cut the DOJ by any means necessary. Shortly afterward, iirc, the two traditionally party-line rules votes failed, something that almost never happens.
In this scenario, to do anything for the good of the country is to betray DJT. This is his standard MO of pushing people in any and every situation to be either with him or against him, no matter what anyone thinks or what the stakes are for anyone else or for any other institution. This time it's for control of the R party and the functioning of the US government. The power of the purse is the tool he's trying to seize now.
At the moment there's no way out for McCarthy or any other R speaker if the goal is to preserve both the R party as an institution and the USA as a functioning government. If McCarthy does what the chaos caucus insists on, we won't have a functioning government (which would suit trump down to the ground, btw). If he wants to save the government by cooperating with Ds, the DJT chaos caucus will move to vacate.
Then what? Absent complete capitulation he'll lose the first vote and won't get a majority of Rs in any later votes. If enough Ds abstain or even vote for him to get him a majority, trump will destroy the R party and the House through intimidation, verbal fulmination, encouraging physical violence, strengthening his hold over the most rabid followers. That might sound good to Ds but Rs will still be the nominal House majority and there are endless ways to obstruct that body. Will the House function? The answer trump wants is, only on his terms.
The least harmful way out might be for half a dozen Rs of the right profile to make a group suicide leap as independents supporting Jeffries. But that's so unlikely it's hardly worth thinking about. At the very least it would take rare courage and statesmanship, and enough money to pay for Romney-level personal security.
The point as I see it is that this budget fight is the current arena of the elemental war trump has been waging against the Constitutional order. Chaos is his friend. The chaos caucus is his tool. McCarthy is road kill. Any R speaker is road kill. January 6 didn't end on January 6. This is shaping up to be January 6 by alternate means.
" If enough Ds abstain or even vote for him.."
All the bad outcomes that you are listing in this paragraph are happening anyway. So Ds shoud vote for McCarthy if there is a motion to vacate, because it will mess up the Republican party, and maybe also keep the government open.
"The least harmful way out might be for half a dozen Rs of the right profile to make a group suicide leap as independents supporting Jeffries."
That is certainly the best solution, but it does require this "half a dozen Rs", and I don't see that happening, and I don't think anybody else sees that happening.
Republicans would never do such a thing. They can imagine that Democrats should vote for McCarthy but none of them would be able to rationalize any circumstance where they could vote for Jeffries.
They wouldn't do it if it meant averting nuclear holocaust.
Agreed, and therefore there is no point in discussing it. What is needed is discussion of what Democrats can do.
As I wrote myself , I don't see the half-dozen Rs breaking ranks, despite that being about the best conceivable solution under the circumstances.
We've had this discussion in other threads. Here's what it comes down to, for me: you think Ds supporting McCarthy would be like kicking over the Republican ant mound out of a clear blue sky, panicking the ants into eating each other. I think Ds supporting McCarthy would be like adding an extra teacup of water to raging floodwaters pouring out of a collapsed dam for all the effect it would have on Rs, because the ones who aren't in the chaos caucus are already clawing their own eyes out as well as everybody else's on their side of the aisle.
And although I know you don't agree, I do think it would make Ds complicit in whatever McCarthy did from then on, because they would have helped put him there this time. And if he _was_ kept in the chair, he would be in exactly the position he's in now. So there's only guilt by complicity to be gained if Ds support him-- unless they have a guarantee that he'll allow floor votes that will be suicidal for him, which he won't do, ie he won't do what the country needs him to do, not before he gets a spinal implant and personality exchange.
There is a group, centered on and answering to trump, that deeply wants to prevent the House from doing anything at all, unless it's what trump thinks helps him. Chaos and uncertainty prevent the House from doing anything as long as they go on, and this serves trump's goal. Ds should not, in my view, do anything to encourage or prolong chaos and uncertainty. They need to keep their hands publicly clean, imho.
Does anyone remember the 60s poster about an argument among the body parts? Eyes, ears, nose, brain, etc? Remember which part won the argument? Spoiler alert, it was the asshole, because nothing else could function anymore when the asshole decided to stop working.
The chaos caucus is the asshole of this Congress and it's trying to win this argument in exactly the same way. For trump, and that's the frame in which all of this is happening.
If nothing moves through the House, trump wins. That's how he sees it, and he's sick enough that he'd happily watch the entire country cease functioning if he thought it would help him get his way.
A foundational failure of conservatism as an idelogy is easy to understand.
If they had any new ideas they wouldn't be conservative would they?
And, not knowing anything about anything, the ideas they would have they can't have because at some point they would have seemed new to them and that would have been wrong so they don't those, either.
And that's why the less they know the more they like it and the more aggressive about it they get because everything at all will present itself as a new idea.
So they are very frustrated.
Trump is running the House, and is likely to keep doing it no matter who Republicans elect as Speaker. This Trump:
There's no reason to think he's altered his views since 2014.
I believe McCarthy enjoys hearing his yowling idiots. This is why he continues. Then he knows they are there for him.