Following the removal of Rep McCarthy (R-CA) as Speaker, the Republicans are exhibiting A-level accomplishments in being incompetent to work as a Party. Instead, as I and many other pundits have predicted, they’re exhibiting the nauseating characteristics of a small spoiled child: not taking direction, not willing to compromise, playing the “ME ME ME” game, denying reality, denying knowledge of reality, and generally being pathological personalities.
No doubt there was some hopes for progress when Rep Scalise (R-LA) won the GOP nomination to be Speaker, but it can be plausibly argued he only won enough votes to win, but not to dominate. Putting an exclamation point on the matter is that Scalise, the nominal winner of the vote, dropped out of the race this evening.
The swift downfall of Scalise’s speakership nomination came just a day after the GOP conference voted for him over Rep. Jim Jordan, 113-99. The withdrawal was as shocking as it was predictable, after a band of Republicans almost immediately blocked his path and said there was no way they would vote for Scalise as speaker. The move deepens the House GOP leadership crisis, with still no indication there is any viable candidate who could secure the 217 votes needed to win the gavel.
Scalise’s primary competition was Rep Jordan (R-OH), who has proven incompetent as a committee chairman and accused of covering up the sexual predatory behaviors of Richard Strauss, a team physician at Ohio State University, an accusation made by OSU wrestlers. Just to keep things light, his supporter Rep Nancy Mace (R-SC), herself a rape survivor, claims she’s never heard of these well-publicized claims.
Like I said, child-like behaviors.
Whether it’s Scalise, Jordan, or my favorite, Rep Emmer (R-MN), it doesn’t really matter. The Party lost its way back in the 1990s under Rep Gingrich’s leadership, and has never found its way back. This seems to be a terminal condition now, though, and only unreasoning loathing of alternatives is keeping them as a credible power.
And that’s leaking away.
