Steve Benen summarizes more cracks in the face of the rotting GOP iceberg:
But by most measures, this week’s feud between two first-year GOP members — Georgia’s Marjorie Taylor Greene and South Carolina’s Nancy Mace — is qualitatively different.
The dispute stems from Rep. Lauren Boebert and her bigoted rhetoric directed at a Democratic colleague. Mace denounced the Coloradan’s anti-Muslim smear, and Greene denounced Mace for having criticized Boebert.
The dispute took an unfortunate turn yesterday, as Greene described Mace as “the trash of the GOP Conference,” adding a personal attack related to abortion, while the South Carolinian responded with a tweet that used emojis to call Greene a “bats— clown.” The right-wing Georgian took her concerns to Donald Trump, as if he were the grown-up.
This is what you see when fourth and fifth raters are beholden to someone besides themselves for their power – they’re cavorting in corruption in order to get the attention of their master.
Literally.
The difference between ambition restrained and ambition unrestrained, and the weakness of the latter system, is that the former encourages competency and honor, while the latter encourages skills and character traits unrelated, even detrimental to, the honorable execution of their duties.
Look for accusations of each other being insufficiently loyal to the former President to spill forth soon enough. Remember former Representative Roby (R-AL)? She was as conservative as could be – and that was not good enough to immunize her from being primaried by other conservatives shouting about her lack of loyalty when she found the former President’s “pussy” comments repugnant. Well, this is worse. None of them would be in office without their loyalty to Trump, and that leaves them with a dubious – very dubious – moral and intellectual foundation.
And Benen’s concerned about Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) being unable to keep his party members in line? He’s a never-ran. He has no chance of being an effective leader. Not because of personal failings, of which he appears to have a few, but because of the composition of the elected officials from his Party.
Let’s hope the Democrats manage not to follow them down the tubes. I remain concerned about a rot at the heart of the Democrats, but perhaps they can scrape that out. Pelosi, Schumer, and Biden have a lot of experience. Let’s hope they can figure it out.
