The destruction of the Republican Party, the political strategy of former Speaker, quitter, and Rep Newt Gingrich (R-GA), and possibly some other parts of the conservatives, such as the “conservative movement,” appears to be well under way now, and while the following report from Fox News seems, and is, extraordinary, I think we’re going to find it’s just the first in a series of many chronicling the Republican Party being torn apart by its constituent power-seekers, selfish and fourth-rate.
Thirty-one House Republicans are doubling down on their threat to oppose any legislation in the next Congress that is favored by GOP senators who vote for a massive $1.7 trillion spending bill this week.
The group of House Republicans, led by Texas Rep. Chip Roy, says the threat is serious. In a letter sent to Senate Republicans on Wednesday, which was obtained exclusively by Fox News Digital, the lawmakers said they would block “even the smallest legislative and policy efforts.”
“We reiterate that if any omnibus passes in the remaining days of this Congress, we will oppose and whip opposition to any legislative priority of those senators who vote for this bill – including the Republican leader,” the lawmakers wrote.
Their threat could have major repercussions for next year, as the GOP-controlled House will only be able to lose a handful of votes on any piece of legislation before having to rely on Democrats to secure passage.
And the Senate GOP reaction?
Alabama Sen. Richard Shelby said he does not think the House message “intimidates anyone.”
Will we be seeing a war between GOP Senators and GOP Representatives? Probably not. For one thing, GOP Senators will find it difficult to initiate legislation that is not inherently bipartisan, as they are in a 51-49 minority. That legislation which the Senate passes and sends on to the House will either be highly obscure, such as the naming of Post Offices, and thus of dubious worth in blocking, or of high enough popularity that the entire House GOP will not be willing to put their seats on the line in order to satisfy the demands of an extremist faction.
But the threats, the tendentious noise from these names, such as McCarthy (CA), Chip Roy (TX), Gosar, Greene, and quite a few others, will be enough to signal the continuing dissolution of the Republican Party. By dissolution I do not mean shrinkage, for there are plenty of extremist barstool types who will think they’ve found a political home that will welcome these views that are so tenuously linked to reality; but the clamor and bizarre, brutal contents of their voices will dismay the independents, who are the keys to power in our current and future political situation.
Do you doubt it? Elsewhere I discussed Democratic over-performance in the 2018, 2020, and 2022 elections, relative to expectations; only in the 2021 Virginia and New Jersey off-year elections did they fail to outrun expectations[1]. The boisterous foolishness of a GOP full of officials dedicated to self-aggrandizement, religious nonsense, grifting, and associated poor behaviors will continue to repel independents, regardless of what the currents of history, if you will, are thought to dictate by conventional pundits. It’s necessary for Democrats to direct independents’ attention to the unacceptability of the GOP candidates for office, but that appears to be less and less of a problem, as the overperformance that I noted appears to indicate that GOP marketing wing, once second to none, may either be breaking down, or just can’t find a way to successfully market such names as Finchem (R-AZ), Lake (R-AZ), and many other Republicans to the electorate. It’s probably a combination of the two.
And, meanwhile, more Republicans, once considered extremists in their own right, will be chased from the party, branded RINOs. Hike up your shirts, folks, so we can read your cattle marks easily enough.
1 This could have been an important lesson for the Democrats, but I think they’ve only learned some elements of it, such as disassociating from the Defund the police slogan. Others, such as their premature position on transgenderism and consequent tactic of bullying, do not seem to have been recognized.
