U.S. Politics January 2023: Kevin McCarthy's Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Life

The GOP is an automatic-engine 2009 Suzuki Forenza with transmission damage and will continue to be after this

Well - senators run statewide which means they often moderate their positions for reelection. But these gerrymandered House member can only survive by being complete whackjobs

yeah, those 14 or so who flipped will probably have primary challengers calling them traitors.

i didn't think swalwell was great or anything, but i'm kind of surprised that he is this wrong

I don’t know who will become Speaker, but one thing just happened we should all celebrate: the Freedom Party is dead. The majority of them just flip-flopped on McCarthy. They got rolled. And I’m here for it!
The flippers@RepRalphNorman@Rep_Clyde@ByronDonalds @realannapaulina

— Rep. Eric Swalwell (@RepSwalwell) January 6, 2023

dude. they run the house now. if they're dead, they're dead in the way that zombies who attack a house and murder everyone inside are dead

it's fun to LOL at the situation and yeah, it might cause some friction in-party, but in the end, despite how not a unified, well-oiled machine they are, the GOP House will return to collaborating on really horrible, awful shit that doesn't make anybody's lives easier.

Swalwell can have fun imagining their death but yeah, if Trump himself didn't kill the GOP, this definitely won't

A little reminder that a lot of it will be DOA in the Senate. It's the (literal) in-house stuff to be concerned about, which I'm not handwaving.

This is kind of true, but the more McCarthy has to concede to these garbage people, the worse the republicans will look overall to average Americans. The last few elections show just how much people are turned off by their bullshit. It's going to be a bad couple of years, but I also think it will continue the process of the republican party absolutely torching any last shreds of credibility that they had.

Swalwell's just trying to suggest a bit of spin into the politiverse, KM.

xxpost yeah I'm not worried about bills, I'm worried about pointless dog-whistle investigations (i.e. "was COVID a lab leak?", "did Biden illegally shut down Hunter investigation", corruption of things like intelligence committees, etc.

no actual destructive legislation will come out of it for the next two years.

still rather have the GOP have the House than the Senate though.

xp aimless

perhaps so! but it seems like rather shortsighted, bad spin to say that the freedom caucus is dead when they are running the house for the next 2 years.

I also think it will continue the process of the republican party absolutely torching any last shreds of credibility that they had.

I'm not snarking you, but I've seen this sentence in many forms since 2006.

Swalwell is a moron.

Yeah, the 2022 midterms surprised many of us, but anything "conservative" and "GOP" IS Freedom Caucus sewage.

oh shit, this might be the vote that ends it? only mccarthy and jeffries are nominated for this round.

Hoping for seven "present"s under the tree.

if not, a fun way to force an end is to all vote to approve a "STOP THE COUNT" method.

which is, the clerk running proceedings sets a timer to a random amount of time, and doesn't tell anybody, and they take roll call.

when that timer expires, she yells "stop the count" and the winner is who has the most votes at that exact point.

the key part of the spin was that they were flip-floppers who swore they'd never let McCarthy be speaker. the part about their death was just the needle to get the flip-flopper part injected into the public mind. but it won't work unless it gets memified by the QAnon'ers.

Hoping for seven "present"s under the tree.

― The Terroir of Tiny Town (WmC), Friday, January 6, 2023 2:12 PM bookmarkflaglink

me too, but when they cast their first vote during roll call, they are able to change it up until the final vote is recorded, so if some of the McCarthy holdouts saw what was happening they might change their vote to fuck the Dems. I don't believe Gaetz one moment where he says he'd be ok with a Dem speaker over McCarthy.

nope, nevermind - though not formally nominated, jordan has already received votes from Biggs and Boebert.

and no, no again.

a handful of holdouts are about to be on television all weekend, which is what they wanted

I guess two McCarthy voters who missed today's votes are coming back later. So he would only need to flip two of the holdouts to win.

Noebert and Statutory Gaetz

I also think it will continue the process of the republican party absolutely torching any last shreds of credibility that they had.

I'm not snarking you, but I've seen this sentence in many forms since 2006.

It's obviously foolish to say "they are done", but they've been trending in a deeply unpopular direction and have been getting punished repeatedly for it (granted, this may be less apparent from the FL perspective). The big concession they appear to be getting is a green light for a debt ceiling standoff, which most people absolutely hate. This is not going to go well for them. Likewise, very few people are going to be thrilled by 2 years of hearings about Hunter Biden's dick.

never underestimate the selective amnesia of americans. republicans got 3 million more votes than democrats in the 2022 midterms. there are caveats around the number because many of the races were blowouts, polarization, races in which democrats didn't bother running a candidate, etc etc. but it was also the first time since 2014 that republicans got more overall votes than democrats in the house.

very few people are going to be thrilled by 2 years of hearings about Hunter Biden's dick

Oh ... I don't know about that

There is a rusty bridge here on the DC beltway that is occasionally tagged with giant graffiti in the same style each time. One time it simply said "FUGAZI" and currently it says "HUNTER HIDEN."

_ very few people are going to be thrilled by 2 years of hearings about Hunter Biden's dick_

Oh ... I don't know about that

Which is Most of them..

not surprising, but mccarthy's on board with the next debt ceiling hostage situation. i'm not even sure he had to "concede" that to the freedom caucus. it's a regular weapon of the GOP, whenever they're in power in the house

THERE IT IS: McCarthy agreed to give Freedom Caucus the keys to the car on pushing for national debt default. pic.twitter.com/Hl33FpQnSv

— Josh Marshall (@joshtpm) January 6, 2023

Normal people, which is most of the have already shown they don’t care.
― Lord Pickles (Boring, Maryland), Friday, January 6, 2023 3:37 PM (four minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

Which is Most of them..

― Lord Pickles (Boring, Maryland)

Oh, right, you're not gay, you're normal.

Since the Dems know the debt terrorism is coming, I really don't think they ought to negotiate at all. I'm afraid that's counter to Biden's make-a-deal instincts, but every time the GOP has shut down the government over this bullshit it always blows up in their faces. The Dems need to just make them own it. No negotiating with terrorists.

oh yeah, for sure. from the democratic perspective, there are few options. you just have to let them do it, again, and hope that they suffer any sort of consequence, for it. but 2023 is a great year to do it for the GOP. it'll take place more than a year before the 2024 elections. there is 0.0% chance that any voter will remember it in Nov 2024.

This time around I doubt Biden will negotiate. You can see in the last six months that he likes winning.

Most Americans didn't care about endless Benghazi / email hearings either, but the ones who cared REALLY cared.

Most Americans don't care about Hunter's laptop, but the people hyperfocused on it are REALLY hyperfocused on it. The Gaetz/Boebert crowd isn't trying to win the applause from most Americans, they're trying to satisfy a specific bloodthirsty niche audience. And they're good at it.

Just like most Americans don't care about this farrago; it's a part of the Washington-is-broken-both-parties-suck drivel I hear in the wild at least twice a week.

but the more the GOP in general becomes associated with the boebert wing, the worse they will fare in state and federal elections.

Yeah, I think overall this hurts the Republicans. And a debt shutdown will too, especially if the Democrats get their messaging in order. Not just make them own the shutdown, but highlight why they're doing it (because they want to cut Social Security, Medicare, etc).

there is 0.0% chance that any voter will remember it in Nov 2024.

You know that "smart people"/"Washington insiders" said this about repealing Roe v. Wade, right? People remember shit when it pisses them off enough. And tanking the economy — because that is what will happen; it will be a Brexit-level financial catastrophe, worse than the 2008 recession but happening in, like, a week — will piss off EVERYONE. It will particularly piss off the rich investor class, because it's not the kind of thing you can hedge against or short sell your way out of. We will be FFFFFUUUUUCKED.

News: Katie Porter may launch Senate campaign before Feinstein announces her 2024 plans per five sources

Lee also planning run and Schiff’s said he’ll consider seat if DiFi retires

⁦@sarahnferris⁩ ⁦@hollyotterbein⁩ https://t.co/kYcdPyDdRS

— Burgess Everett (@burgessev) January 6, 2023

the thing about remembering individual events come time to vote is yeah people might not be thinking of some thing that happened years ago but it doesnt mean that thing didnt help to form their opinions

xpost if they actually do succeed in making the U.S. go into default, i think people would remember it a year later. god, i hope they would. but despite their being some temporary political damage to the GOP after they created the 2011 and 2013 debt ceiling hostage situations, it didn't seem to create lasting consequences. at least, no more so than the 2013, january 2018, or dec 2018-jan 2019 government shutdowns.

i guess the question is whether or not this GOP congress would actually push us into default or not. i do agree that it's more likely now than it was the previous two times.

Going after Social Security money was the tipping point for the Bush Admin, forcing a shutdown and/or default because they want everyone's grandma to get $200 less a month is the kind of thing that has consequences down the line.

BREAKING: Live look at the Republican house leadership as we enter the 4th straight day of the speaker holdout. pic.twitter.com/hhQ369dZ69

— James (@GravitysRa1nbow) January 6, 2023

Just like most Americans don't care about this farrago; it's a part of the Washington-is-broken-both-parties-suck drivel I hear in the wild at least twice a week.

― Malevolent Arugula (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, January 6, 2023 1:14 PM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

Most people are actually correct when they say this sort of "drivel."

The difference is one party has genuine differences within it about the influence of corporate money, the role of labor unions, what to do with lawless police departments, our posture toward Israel, etc. It's a political party. While the other nominal party -- a pathology really -- comprises trolls and insurrectionists.

democrats have a good politics wing but theyre not the ones in charge

I agree with you insofar as what you say is correct, but tend to think that most of the disagreements within the Dems are performative, as they know where their bread is buttered. We can disagree on this again, but let's just leave it at me being more of a cynic.

I'm not a labor lawyer, but this strikes me as a big deal?

In a far-reaching move that could raise wages and increase competition among businesses, the Federal Trade Commission on Thursday unveiled a rule that would block companies from limiting their employees’ ability to work for a rival.

The proposed rule would ban provisions of labor contracts known as noncompete agreements, which prevent workers from leaving for a competitor or starting a competing business for months or years after their employment, often within a certain geographic area. The agreements have applied to workers as varied as sandwich makers, hairstylists, doctors and software engineers.

Studies show that noncompetes, which appear to directly affect roughly 20 percent to 45 percent of U.S. workers in the private sector, hold down pay because job switching is one of the more reliable ways of securing a raise. Many economists believe they help explain why pay for middle-income workers has stagnated in recent decades.

Very big.