Chaos in the GOP

[kallend 1,635]

Both in total votes cast and in representatives elected, the American people did not vote for an extreme right wing agenda in 2022.

I don't know if it's arrogance, stupidity, fear of reprisals in the primaries, or something else altogether that is leading the House GOP to believe it has a mandate to shove the extremists' agenda down out throats.

The solution seems pretty obvious yet no-one in the House GOP seems to have the guts to go with it.

[jakee 1,257]

13 minutes ago, kallend said:

I don't know if it's arrogance, stupidity, fear of reprisals in the primaries, or something else altogether that is leading the House GOP to believe it has a mandate to shove the extremists' agenda down out throats.

Apparently the answer is it’s the natural consequence of extreme gerrymandering. Now that a significant portion of the R side of the House run in artificially created completely one-sided districts they have absolutely no need to appeal to the majority of the American people - or the majority of people in their State or even their local area. In fact, the election they have to win isn’t the election - it’s the primary. And who can be bothered to come out and vote in the primary of a district where the overall election result is a foregone conclusion? Mostly the hardcore of the party.

After all that it is actually an electoral hindrance - if not outright career suicide - for many House GOP representatives to give any hint of anything but the most extreme and divisive right wing positions.

[grimmie 176]

It will be interesting to see how this plays out for Matt Gaetz. 
 

If this turns into the speaker fiasco going on for weeks, does he become a Republican hero or zero? Not MAGA, because they all love the chaos, but real GOPers.

 

I think he may have committed political suicide unintentionally.

 

But who knows in this upside down political era.

[gowlerk 1,916]

4 hours ago, GeorgiaDon said:

Someone who could get votes from both sides, enough to total 217.  It would have to be someone who isn't planning on running for re-election though, unfortunately. 

And any R who votes for them would also need to be planning on retiring.

[gowlerk 1,916]

3 hours ago, kallend said:

I don't know if it's arrogance, stupidity, fear of reprisals in the primaries, or something else altogether that is leading the House GOP to believe it has a mandate to shove the extremists' agenda down out throats.

They know they don't have a mandate. They also know the leverage the current situation gives them, that it won't last, and they can play hardball with the tools the system has given them. It is going to continue to be chaos until next November.

[wmw999 2,130]

31 minutes ago, gowlerk said:

They know they don't have a mandate. They also know the leverage the current situation gives them, that it won't last, and they can play hardball with the tools the system has given them. It is going to continue to be chaos until next November.

They’re too young to remember that in the classic TV show “Get Smart,” the KAOS agents were the bad guys.

Wendy P. 

[headoverheels 291]

8 hours ago, wmw999 said:

... the KAOS agents were the bad guys.

 

They still are

[wmw999 2,130]

Well talk to the Republican who controls them. Most of us liberal types understand that the guy who has them controls them. And he gave them to that liberal mouthpiece Fox News 

Wendy P. 

[jakee 1,257]

1 hour ago, wmw999 said:

And he gave them to that liberal mouthpiece Fox News 

Just remember - to him that doesn't sound like irony.

[kallend 1,635]

At the state level, the Wisconsin GOP's desperate attempts to protect its highly gerrymandered districts seems to have failed.  

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/10/22/democrats-wisconsin-supreme-court/

 

 

[wolfriverjoe 1,346]

4 hours ago, kallend said:

At the state level, the Wisconsin GOP's desperate attempts to protect its highly gerrymandered districts seems to have failed.  

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/10/22/democrats-wisconsin-supreme-court/

 

 

Disclaimer: Wisconsin resident who has voted for Rs in the past (pre-Trump) but will NEVER do so again.

Vos is an idiot. He's pulled his shit and gotten away with it for too long.
He doesn't realize it won't keep working.

Wisconsin is pretty evenly divided. Statewide races (Governor, US Senator, Supreme Court) are usually pretty close. Recounts are fairly common. Protasiewicz won with an 11% margin. That's HUGE right now.

Part of her message as a candidate was that the gerrymandering was wrong.

Vos has claimed repeatedly (and incorrectly) that for Protasiewicz to state her position on an issue likely to come before her is inappropriate. He's wrong.
She NEVER said how she'd rule, just that gerrymandering is wrong in principle because it disenfranchises voters.

The fact that the R/D split in statewide races is usually very close (the Barnes/Johnson race for US Senate in the same election went to a recount) compared to the nearly 2/3 majority the Rs have in the state legislature (both Assembly & Senate) kind of shows that to be true.

Vos repeatedly called for an impeachment. With the exception of a few Trumpettes and a handful of sycophants, nobody agreed.
While it was possible that the impeachment would have occurred, there's no way she would have been removed.

[lippy 773]

1 hour ago, wolfriverjoe said:

While it was possible that the impeachment would have occurred, there's no way she would have been removed.

My understanding was that the game plan wasn’t necessarily to remove her, but rather to exploit a loophole in the constitution that states the justice cannot ‘practice office’ while impeachment is ongoing. So they impeach her, then drag their feet to slow-roll the process while she’s effectively stuck on the bench (or off the bench, as the case may be). 
 

Either way, I’m glad they’re not pulling the trigger on that whacky scheme 

[ryoder 1,390]

So the GOP just nominated Emmer for speaker, and the Orange Fool helpfully responded with this:

 

[billvon 2,406]

25 republicans opposed Jordan, and his bid for speaker failed.

So far 26 republicans oppose Emmer.

Thoughts and prayers.

[wmw999 2,130]

It’s a country, not a toy to be discarded if you break it.

Wendy P. 

[billvon 2,406]

6 minutes ago, wmw999 said:

It’s a country, not a toy to be discarded if you break it.

Wendy P. 

"An evil man will burn his own nation to the ground to rule over the ashes." - not Sun Tzu but applicable here.

[jakee 1,257]

1 hour ago, billvon said:

25 republicans opposed Jordan, and his bid for speaker failed.

So far 26 republicans oppose Emmer.

This seems like it's going to be the case no matter who gets chosen. And as Trump points out above - maybe that's because there really isn't a single unified Republican party anymore. There is at least the Maga party and the traditional GOP / RINO party (depending on your point of view), and they no longer appear to have very much of a connection with each other. 

In that case, the Democrats actually have a plurality in the House, and could easily argue that Hakeem Jeffries is the front runner for Speaker. The traditional GOP, who will sooner or later have to come to terms with being a small minority party in this House, just need to decide who to join a coalition with - the Maga crazies who hate them or the grown up Democrats who'll work with them.

[GeorgiaDon 340]

Oh for fuck's sake!  The malignant cancer that is the Republican Party must by now be obvious to all. 

As much as I would enjoy the irony, Jeffries is not going to become the Speaker.  The Democrats should put an end to this charade, if given a chance, by voting for a "less evil" Republican candidate if necessary, or just have enough of their side vote "present" to let the less evil one get a majority.  Emmer wasn't great by any means, but he didn't vote against certifying Biden's victory in 2020 and he did vote for the temporary spending bill to prevent a shutdown a few weeks ago, so he isn't completely off the deep end.  I suspect that is why the Republicans won't let the vote get to the full House, as the MAGA ones don't want the Democrats to have an opportunity to end this madness.

Of course, even if they do find a way to elect a Speaker then the actually tough issues will be in their faces, such as coming up with legislation that can pass in the Senate and be signed into law.  Meanwhile the arsonist-in-chief is busy lighting his little dumpster fires to try to burn down the whole country.

[kallend 1,635]

8 minutes ago, GeorgiaDon said:

Oh for fuck's sake!  The malignant cancer that is the Republican Party must by now be obvious to all. 

 

Apparently not.

Since retiring I have come to realize that the world I worked in and the people I associated with were not representative of the intellectual capacity of the voting population as a whole.  The are some really poorly informed people out there.

 

We know who loves the poorly educated.

[jakee 1,257]

6 minutes ago, GeorgiaDon said:

The Democrats should put an end to this charade, if given a chance, by voting for a "less evil" Republican candidate if necessary, or just have enough of their side vote "present" to let the less evil one get a majority.

They also need to weigh up the needs of the present moment vs the future of all House business. McCarthy could maybe have seen the Dems step aside as you say - but he deliberately snubbed them. Similarly, any other 'less evil' Speaker will still preside over an obstructionist house that gives nothing to the Dems unless there are solid concessions negotiated first by one who realises his party is no longer the majority.

[gowlerk 1,916]

1 hour ago, jakee said:

The traditional GOP, who will sooner or later have to come to terms with being a small minority party in this House, just need to decide who to join a coalition with - the Maga crazies who hate them or the grown up Democrats who'll work with them.

Exactly.

[gowlerk 1,916]

1 hour ago, GeorgiaDon said:

As much as I would enjoy the irony, Jeffries is not going to become the Speaker.  The Democrats should put an end to this charade, if given a chance, by voting for a "less evil" Republican candidate if necessary, or just have enough of their side vote "present" to let the less evil one get a majority. 

They will be doing that when a power sharing deal of some kind is offered. Just getting a Speaker is not the end game. Somehow legislation must also be passed and as McCarthy discovered that will take compromise and some level of trust.

[lippy 773]

1 hour ago, jakee said:

They also need to weigh up the needs of the present moment vs the future of all House business 

That assumes that they’re able to think past the current news cycle, which I think is giving them more credit than they deserve. 

[kallend 1,635]

SO Johnson gets the gavel.

Wants to criminalize abortion, against LBGQT rights, worked had to overturn Biden's election.

All around asshole. 

 

[Phil1111 913]

16 minutes ago, kallend said:

SO Johnson gets the gavel.

Wants to criminalize abortion, against LBGQT rights, worked had to overturn Biden's election.

All around asshole. 

 

Is a hard core evangelical, hard core supporter of the insurrection and the Biden stole the election movement.

But there is hope for America. He is a lawyer so maybe he get deeper in the save Donald movement and get indicted.