The House Republican Caucus

Ladies and gentlemen, meet your new Republican U.S. House majority!

After vilifying the Democrats for daring to give Americans nice things like child care, the right to organize, and paid family leave, the Republicans placed the name of one Kevin McCarthy in nomination for Speaker of the House.  After one ballot, House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries got the most votes - 212 votes from the Democrats to McCarthy's 203 and 19 Republican votes against McCarthy.  On the second ballot, the result was the same except that the 19 anti-McCarthy Republican votes were cast for the same man, the same "white knight" candidate that MAGA Republicans presented as a consensus choice - Representative Jim Jordan of Ohio, who had ironically nominated McCarthy for the second ballot.

That was the MAGA Republicans' secret consensus candidate?  

Then 20 Republicans voted against McCarthy on the third ballot.  House Clerk and de facto Speaker Cheryl Johnson - a black woman chosen by former Speaker Nancy Pelosi in 2019 - adjourned the House until noon today.

Kevin McCarthy looked forward to becoming Speaker and moving forward on having President Biden, his family, and his Cabinet investigated to death, but until a Speaker is chosen, the Republicans can't get anything done, they can't set their agenda . . . honey, they and their Democratic counterparts can't even get sworn in.

The Republicans might have to dump McCarthy and find a new candidate.  Theoretically , any American citizen 25 or older can be Speaker of the House - it doesn't have to be a sitting House member.  In that case . . . why not me?

Hey, I could use the work.

And I could meet a lot of members of Congress, like this Republican gentlewoman from Iowa!

The Democrats in the House clearly enjoyed watching the Republicans implode, but Nancy Pelosi must have been especially pleased to see Kevin McCarthy, a man she has absolutely no respect for, be embarrassed over and over.  I may have said that Tim Ryan's ambition likely got him into trouble with Pelosi when he challenged her for the position of House Democratic leader in 2016, leading to his political career's untimely demise when he left the House for an unsuccessful bid for a Senate seat from Ohio, but as humiliating as it must have been for Tim Ryan to go through what he went through . . . at least he can be glad he didn't endure what McCarthy is enduring right now.