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How Long Will McCarthyism Last? [1]
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Date: 2023-01-11
Republicans in Riot over grievance. Republican Real Men for Real America Debate. Mike Rogers, a "team normal" Republican, learns the new Rules Package
McCarthyism is back. REM’s song is no longer a satire, only it’s “re-electing McCarthy” rather than exhuming him. The original Tailgunner Joe was in the Senate, but he was about as brave as the man Donald Trump called “MyKevin.”
Let’s review the courage of McCarthy, the leadership of McCarthy. He was one of the Young Guns of the GOP, along with Eric Cantor and Paul Ryan. These three, in 2010, were a new era of Republican leadership. They had clear ideas on balancing the budget and fighting the swamp of Washington. They were hard nosed wonks.
In 2009, there was the infamous steakhouse meeting, where Tom DeLay, Eric Cantor, and Mitch McConnell came up with the agenda to “vote no on everything Obama proposes” in order to doom him to be a one-term president. Bold thinking on the House side came in the Benghazi hearings. Kevin McCarthy was going to be Speaker of the House after John Boehner’s resignation. However, he made a statement to the television cameras about the three separate House investigations of Benghazi where, asked what value they had, he said the dunking stool treatment “damaged her polling numbers” and “showed her untrustworthy.”
He had to bravely run away from losing a bid to be Speaker of the House.
With Donald Trump in office in 2016, McCarthy wanted to be his speaker, his instrument in the house — especially after Ryan retired. He found out what kind of candy Donald Trump liked (Starburst, but only the red ones), and so he had a jar filled with only red ones delivered. From then on, he was “MyKevin” to Trump.
Leadership!
On January 6, 2021, McCarthy had a human reaction to seeing a mob come to kill all the House members. He grew angry. When Donald Trump yelled at Kevin for being angry, Kevin showed a human response: he denounced the man who broke the law.
Weeks later, he showed leadership by forgetting all that he had felt and said. He saw the donations Trump was getting from WinRed. He saw the primary votes. With a spine of Silly Putty and the ethics of Waylon Smithers, he embraced the man who was ready to murder him.
Offered everything he asked for in an investigation of January 6th, he walked away — imperiling his members and inspiring the public hearings. Such leadership!
And, this week, we have seen the floor fight that, like January 6, 2021, is an actual fistfight delayed and slowed down. The punch Mike Rogers didn’t get to throw will be thrown.
And McCarthyism 2023 means that any member of the House can enter a petition to vacate the chair. Hakeem Jeffries can enter a privileged motion tomorrow, if he chooses. The moment the “subcommittee on the weaponization of the federal government” is scheduled to sit for the first time, Adam Schiff can move to vacate the chair. At that point, they go back to the voice votes. Leadership means scattering handguns (literally, by the way, since all the mags are gone) around and giving power to the first person to pull a trigger.
He is Speaker of the House.
Hence my question:
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