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Writer's pictureHowie Klein

McCarthy's Big Mistake Was To Toss Aside Working In A Bipartisan Way Despite Such A Narrow Margin

That Gave Trump And His MAGAts Complete Control Of The House



I almost feel sorry for Kevin McCarthy— almost but not— screw him… another overreaching politician and grotesque product of the Peter Principle. McCarthy may well have been a competent assistant city fire chief in Bakersfield, maybe a good sandwich seller in the back of his uncle's yogurt shop on Stine Road, a good chair of the California Young Republicans and maybe even a decent, glad-handing district director for Congressman Bill Thomas. But… then he was elected to the state Assembly and it’s been all downhill— in terms of competence— since then, as even his old boss, Rep. Thomas has told anyone who’s asked. And now, incredibly, he’s Speaker of the House, albeit the weakest Speaker in living memory… and a danger to the country.


Yesterday, desperate to appear to the Senate and the public as if House Republicans are serious about governance— they aren’t— he pitched his conference on a minibus of government funding bills as a way to move forward on appropriations as tensions in the conference threaten a government shutdown, the preferred outcome of Trump and his allies— and something McCarthy will soon be defending. Yesterday, he proposed that the House “package the regular appropriations bills covering military construction and Veterans Affairs (MilCon-VA), the Pentagon, and the Department of Homeland Security along with disaster relief funding.”


Immediately, House neo-Nazis Andy Ogles (R-TN), Bob Good (R-VA) and Dan Bishop— all eager to force a government shutdown— were skeptical. “I’ll vote against everything until we get fundamental delivery on the basic promise that was made in January,” said Bishop, “which is spending cuts in exchange for allowing defense to rise.”


Right after McCarthy’s proposal he had to delay a procedural vote (a rule) for a Department of Defense appropriations bill because there were enough fascists in opposition to derail it. (McCarthy had even tweeted the rule for the nuts in his ranks by added a provision that would prevent states from banning the sale of gas-powered cars. Ralph Norman (R-SC) announced he would join the other neo-Nazis in voting against it, enough to tank it without help from Democrats. Norman said he was going to vote “NO” because McCarthy hasn’t provided the “Freedom” Caucus with the overall top-line figures for all 12 appropriations bills,” which the fascists have claimed he promised them when they allowed him to become speaker.


Earlier, New York progressives AOC and Jamaal Bowman warned that McCarthy’s detractors in his own party are basically agents of chaos on behalf of the Trump campaign. Read this AOC tweet from late Tuesday morning:


Want to hear Gaetz's nuttery? Just click on him

Around the same time, Bowman, a strong AOC ally, tweeted “Holy cow. All HELL is breaking loose on the floor of the House. Matt Gaetz is threatening to launch a 'mutiny' against Kevin McCarthy and oust him from power. To the speaker of the House: This is what you created. You are the worst kind of coward and now you reap what you sow. You have cow-towed and bent to the demands of the most EXTREMIST zealots in your party at the cost of our institutions and Democracy. While the extremists are a small minority, you have COWARD before them and allowed them to lied; intimidated, and strong armed their dangerous political ends. Instead of leadership, you have shown nothing but cowardice. You care about nothing except your own power. You might be Speaker today, but if you don’t stand up to this harmful element of your own party, you will allow them to destroy you and us in the process. Mr. Speaker, grow a back bone. Because until then, you do not SPEAK for anyone.”


Pramila Jayapal noted, also on Tuesday, that “This impeachment is Kevin McCarthy’s shiny new object to distract the public from the fact that the GOP can’t even pass bills to fund the government. So, here we go— headed to an extreme MAGA Republican shutdown while they play political games with a non-starter impeachment.”


Charlie Sykes, put the situation a little differently than his erstwhile allies did: "Trump not only needs the impeachment as a weapon of mass distraction, but also as an instrument of moral flattening. If everyone is a crook, no one is a crook. If everyone is impeached, then impeachment is no longer a badge of shame." Meanwhile, it looks like Señor Trumpanzee has found the perfect witness to attest to his innocence. See?




1 Comment


Guest
Sep 14, 2023

All of this will justify, in the mind of the newly elected fuhrer in November of 2024, the suspension of all constitutional and democratic vestiges.

It's just another illustration that ruling a shithole under your iron boot is not possible if voting (in congress, in elections) still matters. It will be as much a move to prevent interference by the less nazified nazis as to rule in spite of democraps. Trump will tire of "dealing" with even the servile bootlicks like mccarthy and mcturtle.


Mccarthy is trying to keep it together until the reich commences. He won't piss off trump. And he won't do anything useful (apostasy). Wondering why he didn't just go bipartisan is insipid. He wouldn't la…


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