The Definition of Insanity

Republicans won back the majority in the U.S. House of Representatives in the 2022 election. That means they get to choose the Speaker of the House. That individual then gets to appoint chairs of the committees and set the agenda. This happens at the beginning of the new session on the first Wednesday of January every two years.

Almost every time, the Speaker is a member of the majority party and elected by the majority Party. It is the first order of business. It has been a hundred years since a Speaker was not elected on the first ballot. In 1923, it took 9 votes to elect the Speaker. Since then, it was almost pro forma that only one ballot was required.

Then came the Republican Party in the Trump era, and all that changed. There were 14 votes over the course if three days, but no Speaker was elected. Despite the Republican majority, their anointed candidate, Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), failed to get 50% plus one vote. In fact, the nominee of the Democratic Party in the House received more votes each time than Speaker except on the final vote. He would have been Speaker, but he was short of the required 50% plus one vote.

Finally, late Friday night on Jan. 6th, enough deals were cut for McCarthy to get elected Speaker This is a huge embarrassment for the Republican Party. They promised voters they would govern, but they couldn’t even elect their own Speaker on 14 tries. Even worse, a near physical altercation occurred when one Republican lunged at a fellow Republican on the House floor during the session. He was restrained by cooler heads. This is the Republican Party in the Trump era.

One would think that after two failed votes, Republicans would have picked another consensus candidate. Instead, they kept doing the same thing the same way with the same result for fourteen times.

The problem is that those twenty Republican hold outs belong to the extreme right wing of the Party. They wanted a Speaker who agrees with their radical agenda. McCarthy does not. To finally won, he probably made promises to the hold outs. Certainly, the hostage takers probably extracted agreements to tie McCarthy’s hands. For one thing, he agreed that only one member—of either Party can demand a vote for a new Speaker at any time. Given the theatrics of this week, we can expect many votes for Speaker in the next two years. Welcome to Republican rule.

This is a predicator of what to expect from the Republican Congress. Moderate Republicans will put forth legislation that may not sit well with the far right. Therefore, those measures will not pass. Likewise, measures proposed by moderates may be blocked by the gang of 20. Furthermore, it is not likely that much, if any, legislation coming from the Democratic Senate will see the light of day in the House. This is what gridlock looks like.

This is the new reality in the Trump era. The Republican Party was totally united behind Trump. His loss in 2020, however, and the poor showing of Trump-backed candidates in 2022 have brought some Republicans to their senses. Some discovered the Emperor has no clothes .But not all.

Now the Congress is divided into three camps: Democrats, traditional Republican, and Trumplicans. It is looking quite unlikely that much will get done for two years unless a strong leader emerges, or if Trump goes to prison and thus his ability to manipulate his supporters is diminished.

Meanwhile, major problems that need addressed like Ukraine, our crumbling infrastructure, inflation, and global warming which is causing millions of dollars damage to our infrastructure every week.

We wait for the next installment of insanity.