The GOP managed to get us going yesterday. We enjoyed the Nancy Pelosi Speaker show while it lasted. She had an imperious twinge to her reign that had an element of imperious rule to it. We enjoy spectacle and it is hard to argue that her tenure did not have it. What was surprising is that eight Republicans voted to oust the new new former Speaker, Kevin KcCarthy. It is sometimes said that the most effective opposition party is the one that turns on itself. After Madam Pelosi, one would think the GOP would have had enough of her party.

Instead, Speaker Kevin McCarthy failed to keep his leadership post in some frantic gyrations in the House. His 269-day speakership became the shortest in more than 140 years. Joining with a vast majority of Dems, eight radical GOP members voted to send McCarthy to the back benches. Those members had been instrumental in prolonging the 15-vote endurance conference that brought McCarthy to the ruling House position.

The House will now need to elect a new speaker. McCarthy said yesterday he will not try for the Speakership again. We enjoyed his two-thirds of a year in the saddle and have no idea what is coming next. That is the new normal for this Congress. Rep. Matt Gaetz, a same-party activist, forced a successful vote to unseat Speaker McCarthy. We don’t really understand the political maneuver. Like the last extended voting spree, this one seemed to be about the budget. We claimed that the $33 Trillion dollar debt tab has the potential to cause real distress for the nation if something is not done to fix it.

That moment seems to have arrived and vanished. McCarthy becomes the first Speaker to be removed from the position in the history of the nation. McCarthy worked with Democrats to avoid a government shut-down, and that was unforgivable to the Freedom Caucus faction of the elected GOP majority and “PFFFFT!” his tenure ended.

There will be a short term funding bill which will satisfy no one. There is not enough spending for one of the parties on the Hill and too much for the other. Speculation about who is next for the maximum House job is rife, as you might expect. There is a “temporary” Speaker position known as a “pro tempore,” or a Latin phrase which means “limited by House Rule,”

This could result not only in a different Speaker than Kevin, and even one from the minority party. There has been talk that former President Trump would be in the speculative mix, since there is no formal requirement for the office-holder to actully be a member of the House to serve. So, beyond Mr. Trump the less controversial figure might be top McCarthy ally, Rep. Patrick McHenry. He represents North Carolina’s 10th Congressional District and stands for something we recall as “Good Government,” or what they think that might be down in Carolina’s northern part.

McHenry’s most recent legislative accomplishment was announcement of a $550K grant to local fire departments in his district, so his fundementals are in keeping with spending what you need to keep the shibboleth of government chugging along towards dissolution. We don’t really think this is all well down the path to that fate. one of the Writer’s Section was a credentialled staff member in the 104th congress when something more significant than this occurred. The Blue party had been in charge of the Speakership for about 40 years, so the occupancy in Leadership was an expected thing. There was a breakfast in Germany in which notification chains came up. It was all different for the first time in a generation or so, so it was a colorful breaking of the morning fast.

Former Speaker McCarthy has said he will not be running again, so we will see what comes from this latest wrinkle in the jumbled pile of Congressional laundry. In this continuing electoral circus, it seems only appropriate and appropriately historic. The only two congressmen whose tenure as Speaker lasted fewer days than McCarthy’s are Michael Kerr and Theodore Pomeroy. They may have made history but ti is unlikely to be repeated on this next one. Rep. Michael Kerr unexpectedly died in office and Pomeroy had only a symbolic
:Last Day” of the 40th Congress after the conclusion of the American Civil War.

By way of confusion, the last two House Speakers, Nancy Pelosi and Paul Ryan, served for 2918 and 1162 days by comparison.

We expect this will lurch forward with Speaker McHenry at the helm. Or we will lurch into something else to make an unknown Congressman famous for a few or many days. Then we will throw Presidential election atop the pile and see if things ignite. We have a suspicion that they will. The latest polling suggests there is a change coming, with the real possibility of more high-jinxs in the traditional means of elections. That is just the way things are these days.

We will have to see, won’t we?

Copyright 2023 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com