Bullying pulpit
Steve Womack’s right mind
Maybe somebody should tell our friends on the far-right that some folks, especially Arkansans, don’t cotton much to bullying. You might find that some of us bow up when pushed a little too hard.
Jim Jordan may or may not make a good speaker of the United States House of Representatives. We don’t know the man from Adam’s off ox. We read in the papers that he’s made his reputation as leading the MAGA-est of the MAGAs in Congress, which means either 1. he speaks for a lot, maybe a majority, of Republicans nationally, or 2. he’s nuts. Depending on your political point of view, your answer would probably fit in amongst one of those two choices.
But pushing Jim Jordan and forcing Jim Jordan are two different things. Some congressmen of the starboard variety are still more than a little ticked that only a handful of representatives in their party pulled the plug on the last speaker. And they don’t seem all that inclined to let the Matt Gaetzes of the world win.
So the Matt Gaetzes of the world started a bullying campaign, which shocks exactly nobody.
Even Fox News’ Sean Hannity got in on the action. According to the story in the paper:
“Hannity vented to his millions of viewers Monday night about the state of the Republican effort to name a new House speaker—taking special aim at the ‘few sensitive little snowflakes in Congress’ who were not supporting Jordan. But the widely watched conservative pundit wasn’t only using his televised bully pulpit to pressure the holdouts. Hannity also spent the weekend personally calling several and having one of his producers reach out to others to lobby them on their vote. He also took to social media to encourage his followers to call wavering members and demand they fall into line.
“Hannity’s effort to personally whip up votes for Jordan highlights the central role that conservative media have played in the weeks-long drama engulfing Capitol Hill over who will wield the speaker’s gavel. At each turn, conservative media figures such as Hannity and former Trump adviser Stephen K. Bannon have injected high-profile disruption into a process that normally plays out quietly behind the scenes in Capitol Hill corridors. A handful of back-bench lawmakers have seized the opportunity to flex their power in a nearly evenly split chamber, creating drama but offering little direction.”
And, in his efforts, Stephen Bannon painted a target on the back of a particular Arkansas congressman.
Apparently Mr. Bannon has a podcast or something. And on his show he noted that Steve Womack (R-Arkansas) hadn’t voted for Jim Jordan, but ought to. So he gave his audience, such that it is, Steve Womack’s phone number. And said about Representative Womack: “You’re in a super MAGA district. You gotta get your mind right.”
Some of us would think that Mr. Bannon doesn’t know us very well if he thinks that Arkansas’ 3rd Congressional District—complete with Fayetteville, Washington and Benton counties and Eureka Springs—is a super-MAGA district, no matter how popular Steve Womack may be every two years on Election Day. But that part about “get your mind right” . . . .
No matter how Steve Womack votes on the speaker chair in the future—whether he supports Jim Jordan one day or not—we can say with near certainty that Stephen Bannon’s chiding him on getting his mind right is not going to have much of an effect. Maybe the opposite. We’ve written about Steve Womack many times in the past, on many subjects, and we never got the impression that he could be pushed around.
For goodness sakes, Rep. Womack told The Wall Street Journal that outof-state callers have cussed out his staff “nonstop” in an effort to get the congressman to fold. He didn’t. But he did say, “When my staff has to absorb the brunt of this kind of verbal assault, then that’s just unacceptable.”
What did Mama say about attracting flies with honey instead of vinegar? Yeah, she was right. As always.
We’d bet that Steve Womack will vote his conscience, with Stephen K. Bannon’s permission.
Or without it.