To save himself, McCarthy just destroyed the House
On the fourth of 14 failed attempts this week to elect Kevin McCarthy as speaker, Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.) complained that Democrats and the media were enjoying the House Republicans’ meltdown too much.
“In some ways they’re salivating,” the lawmaker complained in his speech re-re-renominating McCarthy. “The schadenfreude is palpable.”
No doubt some took pleasure in the Republicans’ pain. But as a longtime reviewer of political theater, I found nothing enjoyable about this performance.
This is what happens when a political party, year after year, systematically destroys the norms and institutions of democracy. This is what happens when those expert at tearing things down are put in charge of governing. The dysfunction has been building over years of government shutdowns, debt-default showdowns and other fabricated crises, and now anti-government Republicans used their new majority to bring the House itself to a halt.
This is insurrection by other means: Two years to the day since the Jan. 6 invasion of the Capitol, Republicans are still attacking the functioning of government. McCarthy opened the door to the chaos by excusing Donald Trump’s fomenting of the attack and welcoming a new class of election deniers to his caucus. Now he’s trying to save his own political ambitions by agreeing to institutionalize the chaos — not just for the next two years but for future congresses as well.
https://wapo.st/3GX51Fv
= new reply since forum marked as read
