Chaos Agents In the House

Steve Scalise didn't even have one day of pretending he was going to be a Real Boy uh Speaker of the House. Via Lisa Mascaro, Farnoush Amiri, and Stephen Groves with AP News:

Republican Steve Scalise ended his bid to become House speaker late Thursday after hardline holdouts refused to back the party’s nominee, throwing the GOP majority into deeper chaos with the chamber unable to function.

Scalise told GOP colleagues at a closed-door meeting late Thursday of his decision and pointedly declined to announce backing for anyone else, including his chief rival, Rep. Jim Jordan, the hardline Judiciary Committee chairman backed by Donald Trump who had already told colleagues he no longer would seek the job.

Next steps are uncertain as the House is essentially closed while the Republican majority tries to elect a speaker after ousting Kevin McCarthy from the job.

As noted yesterday, Scalise already had enough No votes among Republicans that he wasn't going to clear the 217 total threshold to secure a majority of Representatives.

There wasn't much hope for his Speakership if he had gotten it, as the rules that Vacated McCarthy were still in place and likely in use to get Scalise removed down the line.

What happened here was that the demagogues / bomb-throwers among the extremist factions still wanted to hold Congress hostage to prevent any budget deals or further continuing resolutions that a replacement Speaker would be compelled to support. Instead of rallying to unite their party in a moment of public division, those "Freedom Caucus" / "Gym Jordan Or Bust" congresscritters insisted that either they Rule or they Ruin the rest of the nation. 

There is some schadenfreude to be had here as we watch a political party that's risen to power through partisan bullshit tears itself apart applying that partisan bullshit to themselves. However, there is little joy to savor. This is all happening as the planet faces multiple global crises - not just the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East but also increasing climate change disasters and also economic instability with China - that creates an urgency to fill the Speaker's role so that our government can function and respond to these crises.

Which is exactly what the Freedom Caucus / "Government Is Bad" / pro-Russian / racist-sexist bastards want to prevent. They WANT government to fall so they can build their Utopia on the ashes.

An argument could be made that Jordan's supporters now have no opposition to assume the Speakership nomination for the House Republicans... except for the facts that A) he wasn't their first (or second or even third) choice, B) that he's still wildly unpopular outside of his own faction, C) that the party is fully aware Jordan is covered with fleas scandals, and D) that Jordan can easily be denied the nomination the same way Scalise was by those Congresspersons still loyal to McCarthy or Scalise AND still livid at the naysayers for making them look bad.

If the anti-Jordan (Rationalist) factions decide to roll over/surrender to the bomb-throwers now, they have to realize that Jordan will push for a government shutdown anyway, crippling the nation at a moment we should be working. They have to know they'll regret putting that ignorant demagogue in the high chair sooner instead of later. And they'll have to know that if they surrender now, they'll surrender to even more insane demands by the wingnuts to the point the Rationalists will have no power in their own party.

None of this looks good. The chaos is not going to go away because there are too many GOP wingnuts who profit from that chaos.

That all said: We need to change the animal motifs of our major parties. It's turning out that the Republicans are the party made up of asses.