Leopards Eat Kevin McCarthy’s Face, the aptly named piece from the NYTimes, accurately describes the transformation of a fiercely incompetent and bankrupt political party into a self destructive malignant force driven to marginalize this guy to no end, continues unabated as we speak. In viewing this sorry example of gross incompetence of the third kind, the question to as is, could any of these people actually do something to make a living before getting fired.
Why?
For 45+ years, yours truly was self employed. What this means is, one has to be competent in order to make a living. If you don't do the job right, you don't get paid. Other factoids ... As a consultant, you never gossip even though employees will tell almost all once they trust you. Last but not least, you set a valid fee for work to be done after doing due diligence, something akin to The Art of War or The Mythical Man Month as planning takes longer than the job, a notion totally alien to not only the repugs but also to so many dems because if one is guaranteed an income, for at least two years, then one can be eminently stupid, self serving and corrupt to the nth degree but I digress. Michelle Goldberg has it down cold regarding the ongoing CF happening in congress in the first week of 2023.
As we approach the anniversary of the Jan. 6 attack, it’s been grimly amusing to see that the party of insurrection can’t even manage the orderly transfer of power to itself. Rarely does karma play out so neatly.
Kevin McCarthy nurtured the spirit of reactionary nihilism in the Republican Party, first by trying to harness the energy of the Tea Party for his own ambition, and then by his near-total capitulation to Donald Trump. Now the chaotic forces he abetted have, at least for the moment, derailed his goal of becoming House speaker, subjecting him to multiple public humiliations at what was supposed to be his moment of triumph.
It is still possible that McCarthy will manage to eke this thing out by making even more concessions to the growing bloc of Republicans who oppose him. It is not possible, however, that he’ll emerge, in any real sense, as a leader.
Inconvenient truths ...
Unable to corral his caucus for what is usually an easy vote, there is no chance McCarthy would be able to get them on board for hard ones, like keeping the government open or raising the debt ceiling to avoid plunging the country into default. His best-case scenario is that he’d be a fragile figurehead, a hostage to the hard right and constantly in danger of defenestration. And even that scenario looks increasingly out of reach.
Last but not least, the caliber (pardon the pun) or lack thereof of the MAGAs says it all.
As The Times reported, of the 20 lawmakers who, as of this writing, have voted against McCarthy, 17 were endorsed by Trump in 2022. Five of them are freshmen — these are people who are part of Trump’s remaking of the Republican Party. Arizona’s Eli Crane, for example, is a former contestant on the business reality show “Shark Tank,” where he pitched bottle openers made of dummy .50-caliber bullets. (“Shoot open some bottles in the manliest way possible,” says an ad for the product.) Florida’s Anna Paulina Luna, an ally of the Trump die-hard Matt Gaetz, is a veteran and former swimsuit model who built a career as a conservative rabble-rouser, most recently running Hispanic outreach for the right-wing outfit Turning Point USA. These people seem to be crafting brands as much as political careers, meaning they benefit from high drama and have little need to work their way through Republican institutions.
If only the late, great Paddy Chayefsky was alive today to do Network 2023. It would be truly epic.
Newsflash, McCarthy, after 15 tries, finally becomes the weakest speaker in history.
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