Paul Ryan’s exit turns GOP title over to Trump

Paul Ryan essentially entered the nation’s life on a humid Virginia Saturday in 2012, walking down the gangway of the old battleship Wisconsin as Republican candidate Mitt Romney announced his surprise selection as the vice presidential running mate.

The choice of the young, wonky Wisconsin representative was an uncharacteristically bold move by Romney. The presence of the powerful House Budget Committee chairman instantly thrust the role and size of federal government into the lackluster campaign, while energizing the conservative GOP base that had woefully watched weeks of unanswered Democratic attacks on the underfunded Romney.

The political partnership with Ryan, the main architect of the GOP’s plans for tax and spending cuts and crucial entitlement reforms, added instant heft and gravitas to the campaign. And the presence of the 42-year-old Roman Catholic made an attractive contrast to Democratic leaders such as Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi, all in their 70s.

The announcement last week that Speaker Ryan would not seek an 11th House term was another landmark event for the party of Lincoln; this one in the era of Donald Trump. Ryan’s departure come January will mark the official closing of the title transfer to President Trump of complete ownership of the Republican Party, for better or worse.

A lifelong Democratic donor, Trump is no ideologue prepared to stand in the breech or anywhere really over conservative principles. He’s a deal-making pragmatist, which is apparently what a sufficient number of voters in just the right places wanted in 2016.

Ryan gave family time as a main reason for leaving Washington.

“If I am here for one more term, my kids will only have known me as a weekend dad,” said Ryan, who lost his own father as a teenager. Unlike many such exit explanations, that rings true.

Speaker is a major fundraising job. In 2015, when Ryan reluctantly agreed to head the House caucus and attempt to herd his party’s undisciplined, feuding factions, he insisted on open weekends to be with family in their brick house in his hometown of Janesville.

Unlike most in Congress, Ryan has lived the original intended life of a member. He didn’t move to the District of Columbia and end up representing Capitol Hill back to his district. He lives in Wisconsin’s 1st Congressional District and takes the message of its 715,000 residents to Washington every Monday. Which helps explain his 2016 re-election with 65 percent of the vote in a four-man race.

But hidden within his family talk is another cause, one that’s also helped prompt some four dozen Republican members to leave the Hill after this term: the unpredictable, impulsive Oval Office occupant.

On Ryan’s departure announcement, Trump tweeted, “We are with you Paul,” calling him “a truly good man.”

Ryan’s replacement, who if historical patterns hold, may well inherit the undesirable job of minority leader, will most likely be California’s Rep. Kevin McCarthy. Trump likes him, at least this week.

It’s likely he’ll join corporate boards requiring much less travel. Plus paid speeches and perhaps a book on his reform ideas and rise from lowly aide to Rep. Jack Kemp to second in line to the presidency.

This would enable Ryan to be home most days when the kids return from school, when Wisconsin’s sacred deer season opens in October and when his Packers play at home. Unlike Washington life today, all three are predictable.