Republicans trash one more government institution — their own
After Republican dissidents ousted Kevin McCarthy from the speakership this week, Patrick McHenry, the acting speaker, declared a recess by slamming the gavel so hard it looked as though he were trying to ring the bell in a carnival strongman game. Perhaps McHenry (R-N.C.) hoped to hammer some sense into his feuding Republican colleagues? If so, he did not win the prize.
The same lethal combination of vindictiveness, name calling, vulgarity, sabotage and paralysis that caused the meltdown on the House floor continued to consume the party off the floor.
Republican lawmakers, on the verge of fisticuffs in their caucus meeting in the Capitol basement Tuesday night, burst out of the room complaining to reporters about the “bull—-” and “horse—-” decision by McHenry to have a week-long adjournment to cool down.
Rep. Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.) said he would lead an effort to expel Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) from the House Republican caucus — part of the payback for the “eight selfish a—holes” (as Lawler put it to Axios's Andrew Solender) who ousted McCarthy (R-Calif.).
Though House rules gave McHenry the temporary speakership “for the sole purpose of electing a new speaker,” McHenry promptly abused his power by evicting former House speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and former Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) from offices they'd been given in the Capitol; Pelosi, in California for the funeral of Sen. Dianne Feinstein, was told she must vacate immediately and the office locks would be re-keyed.
Republican lawmakers threatened to quit the bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus. The moderate Republican Governance Group threatened to expel Rep. Nancy Mace (S.C.) because she had voted to oust McCarthy.
Former House Republican Markwayne Mullin (Okla.), now in the Senate, attacked Gaetz by giving an interview to CNN's Manu Raju about his former colleague's sexual exploits. Another Senate Republican, John Cornyn (Tex.), said “the next speaker is going to be subjected to the same terrorist attacks” that bedeviled McCarthy.
Three members of the House GOP leadership team that failed so spectacularly over the past nine months — Majority Leader Steve Scalise (La.), Majority Whip Tom Emmer (Minn.) and conference chair Elise Stefanik (N.Y.) — all signaled plans to move up the leadership ladder.
Now the election of a new speaker, scheduled for Oct. 11, is in serious doubt. Neither of the announced candidates, Scalise and Rep. Jim Jordan (ROhio), has a clear path. Others threaten not to elect any speaker without rules changes to prevent a repeat of what happened to McCarthy. And Rep. Troy Nehls (R-Tex.) helpfully announced that he would “nominate Donald J. Trump for Speaker of the House.”
On Wednesday, a casually dressed Rep. Garret Graves (RLa.), a top McCarthy lieutenant, worked his way through the Capitol, warning journalists to settle in for a long slog. “This is potentially a setback of weeks and, I hate to even say this, but potentially even longer,” he told CBS's Nikole Killion.
Perfect. Just six weeks from the next government-shutdown deadline, and with the United States unable to send weapons to Ukraine to hold off Russia's invasion, the House majority has ceased to function at all.
“My fear is the institution fell today,” McCarthy said in his farewell-to-the-speakership news conference Tuesday night. Going down to defeat, he kept claiming that his ouster wasn't “good for the institution” because “I believe in the institution” and “the institution was too important” to be so assaulted by Gaetz (and Democrats) who weren't “looking out for the country or the institution.”
This was rich coming from a man who: voted to overturn the 2020 election results; bowed and scraped at Mar-a-Lago after Jan. 6, 2021; destroyed a bipartisan Jan. 6 commission his own designee negotiated and then trashed the Jan. 6 committee; released Jan. 6 security footage to Tucker Carlson; undermined the rule of law by attacking the prosecutions of former president Donald Trump; and launched the impeachment of President Biden without a shred of evidence of wrongdoing.
I'm sorry, but anyone who thinks McCarthy is a defender of “the institution” ought to be institutionalized.
The former speaker is correct that the House had failed. But he has the causation backward. It didn't fail because he was ousted; he was ousted because the House had already failed. And the ones who caused it to fail were McCarthy and his colleagues.
For years, they have taken every opportunity to trash the institutions of government — the FBI, the Justice Department, the IRS, the “woke” military, the CDC, NIH, the courts, the election system, the presidency. After laying waste to all other institutions, it was inevitable that House Republicans would also trash the one institution they controlled.
McCarthy's allies cast Gaetz as aberrant. But the same demagogic techniques that Gaetz used against McCarthy — dishonesty, conspiracy, vengeance — have been deployed routinely by House Republicans in recent years, and particularly for the past nine months, against the Biden administration and congressional Democrats. Gaetz was merely doing as his Republican colleagues taught him.
When you govern on lies, you can't be surprised when one of your own lies about you. When you govern on personal vendettas, you can't be shocked that one of your own acts on a vendetta against you. When you govern with contempt for democratic norms, you can't be sanctimonious when one of your own trashes the norms that protected you.
After laying waste to all other institutions of government, it was inevitable that House Republicans would also trash the one institution they controlled.
DEAR AMY >> I was with my boyfriend for four years.
We lived together the entire time.
He was my soul mate and stepped in to be the dad in my kids' lives (I have three children from my previous marriage).
I thought everything was amazing and that he was my partner in life.
He died two weeks ago. Because we weren't married, I couldn't be the person to make the arrangements. His mother's family immediately started blocking me from any involvement in the funeral.
He was always protective of his phone and kept it locked.
He stated that this was because of a past experience he'd had with personal information that was spread online.
Well, after his death I had to access his phone in hopes of locating a will, wishes or anything to support getting him put to rest.
I didn't find any of that, but I did find intimate conversations he'd had with multiple women that were very sexual in nature.
I'm talking about pictures, Facebook Messenger, and phone calls spanning the ENTIRE time we were together.
I now feel devastated and disrespected.
How do I grieve the man I was in love with when he was living a double life?
I don't know if he actually had sex with these women, or if it was entirely virtual in nature, but I'm not sure if it even matters.
I know he loved me, but he wasn't the man I thought he was.
How can I mourn and move on when I am hit with this whirlwind?
— Shock of Reality
DEAR SHOCK >> The famous five stages of grief are denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. You might find yourself moving straight into the “anger” stage and staying there for a while.
Given the way this man's family rejected and prevented you from participating in the funeral, as well as the evidence you've uncovered, you quite naturally feel betrayed.
My instinct is that even though you say you were looking for a will on his phone, you might have (subliminally) been looking for pretty much what you found.
And now, you must deal with your children in the very best way you can — allowing them to love and mourn this man without focusing on your own anger or his betrayal.
Keep busy tying up the loose ends of this loss, find housing if you need to, and re-establish yourself with friends and family.
Understand that if you are stuck in “anger,” it will affect your life and future relationships.
Writing down a daily account of your progress and attending a grief group or individual counseling will help.