Kevin McCarthy ousted as speaker in Republican-led House

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/10/03/kevin-mccarthy-house-speaker-vote-2/

by zzzeek • 3 years ago

51 57 3 years ago

cocacola13• 3 years ago

Welcome to the clown show. 15 ballots in January for this. Republicans need to get their house in order. Its embarrassing. Or, at least, it should be. First time in history the Speaker’s been ejected like this.

zolbrek2• 3 years ago

It's my understanding that he didn't live up to his side of the bargain struck with Gaetz & Co. to become speaker, so Gaetz acted accordingly.

KerrAvon4• 3 years ago

The notion that Gaetz is in any way a good guy here is a little bizarre.

But he didn't live up the bargain he struck with the Democrats either.

monero-xmr2• 3 years ago

Politics is a clown show for me period - both sides. I like the chaos. The government that governs best is the one that governs least - so I’m always rooting for shutdowns, gridlock, automatic spending cuts, etc.

KerrAvon4• 3 years ago

This is a small child's view of how things work.

xeromal4• 3 years ago

I'm somewhat in agreeance. I don't want a government that's in such lockstop that everything passes.

izzydata• 3 years ago

Are you Ron Swanson?

cocacola13• 3 years ago

It’s a representative government, so in a way, we’re all clowns here.

hotpotamus• 3 years ago

I'd be amused if we just sent the border patrol and military home. I suspect that would be a bit too small government for a lot of people.

mcphage5• 3 years ago

Too cool for civilization?

KerrAvon4• 3 years ago

They either need to make peace with the Democrats and lose their primaries in 2024 to total MAGA nutjobs, or make peace with the MAGA nutjobs and lose the Biden districts in 2024. Either way, they lose the House in 2024.

Making peace with the Democrats would allow them to retain some dignity, but after 2016 that's not been a high priority for them. So I expect the clown show to continue.

EA-3167• 3 years ago

The things they needed to do to avoid this scenario are all in the past, they're in the "Find Out" phase of the program now. Going with the Southern Strategy, then amping it up over and over, the chicanery around W.'s election, and then throwing it all in on Trump and the Tea Party.

These were all choices that set the stage for this meltdown and loss, and now it's too late to both win AND persevere.

mrguyorama2• 3 years ago

But this is exactly what so many of them want. How many conservatives are convinced that a deadlocked or obstructionist congress is "better" for whatever reason, as if PURPOSEFUL government incompetency is a virtue

lalajollyton• 3 years ago

With the Republicans in disarray and the Democrats fielding Joe Biden, it seems like a good time for a 3rd party candidate for the 2024 election. Possibly the most realistic context for an actual shot at a 3rd party presidency that I've ever seen.

theshrike79• 3 years ago

Americans will never vote a 3rd party in mass. _Everything_ is built on "us vs them", a third party would confuse people too much.

Kreutzer• 3 years ago

I agree. But both parties also actively obstruct third party candidates from appearing on states' ballots. For example: https://apnews.com/cbd7947a020a1c5983a69e804ce3a5f8

timeon3• 3 years ago

US has two-party system. You can't have 3rd party with First-past-the-post and Electoral College.

qclibre22• 3 years ago

Electoral college is not first past the post.

oldbbsnickname• 3 years ago

Yep. Passing the NPVIC is the primary way forward to regulate the Electoral College to respect the popular vote.

There is too much polarization and utopian-adjacent extremists in the US political system at present.

It would take some careful thought how to improve on what the founders could not anticipate, but the current system needs a check & balance on all 3 of POTUS, COTUS, and SCOTUS to replace an unfit-for-office official.

One possibility: Perhaps a 4th branch of government with appointed-for-life by sortition panel of elders who are a safety net "board of directors" whose only function is removal of a particularly unfit elected official by unanimous vote. Their only qualifications for candidacy is that they must be of unreproachable integrity, be at least 45, have no political ties, hold no other office, and have no financial conflicts of interest. A removed elected official would be replaced according to the succession plan for their role, a special election.

Another, more radical possibility: Do away with all political parties, unlimited dark money campaign financing, and populist voting of media celebrities. Instead, fill the highest elected offices by sortition of credentialed professionals for a single 2 year term. Instead of political parties, coalitions would form around positions on issues (more nuanced than parliamentary coalition governments). COTUS and POTUS would still exist, but they would be reduced to organizational administrators who don't need to pander to billionaires. While it takes away the illusion of a sacred freedom, it replaces it with the leadership of uncorrupted, educated people who aren't constantly seeking the approval of campaign donors.

mcphage5• 3 years ago

Yeah, who would possibly vote for Joe Biden—a successful, stable, and reliable president?

jfengel• 3 years ago

I keep hearing comments like that, even from people otherwise in Biden's side. I try to avoid the news; what I hear is only the stuff that creeps over my barriers (and is hopefully in some sense "important").

Biden seems to be dull but moderately effective. He's had no great legislative triumphs, but that's no surprise. The few things he's tried to do dramatically, like student loan forgiveness, have been slapped down by the Supreme Court -- again, no surprise. His son appears to be a real jackass, but only after you factor out vast amounts of outright lies.

He's successfully supported the war in Ukraine, kept inflation and gas prices from getting all that much worse, oversaw the pandemic and transition out of it. Not thrilling, but competent. And yet his approval levels are worse than those of a guy who is literally under indictment for, among other things, mishandling vast amounts of classified material.

Is there something I'm missing? Or do people just want something that the President can't, and shouldn't, do?

soupfordummies• 3 years ago

Almost kinda seems like we're seeing a fork of the Republican party right now.

tootie3• 3 years ago

His speakership was hanging by a thread from day 1. I don't see any path to a new Speaker so long as the Freedom Caucus are intent on watching the world burn.

mrguyorama2• 3 years ago

They are okay with that, because in 40ish days that means the government shuts down, which means no more funding for Ukraine, which for some reason is really really important to the Freedom Caucus

xeromal4• 3 years ago

He sold his soul to the devil to become speaker and the devil kicked him out

mcphage5• 3 years ago

I don't see any path to a new Speaker so long as the Freedom Caucus are intent on watching the world burn.

Well, there’s always reaching across the aisle.

tootie3• 3 years ago

McCarthy had a chance to do that and came out saying he would not be willing to give Dems anything at all to save his job. Right now the GOP agenda is 100% anti-liberal politics. The impeachment hearings taking place with no credible evidence is exhibit A. Advocating a government shutdown is the other. Dems basic ask would just be "can we debate some actual legislation" and the answer from the right has consistently been "no". The GOP have a 9 vote majority, 1 of them is under indictment and 10 completely unreasonable maniacs who just want to cause chaos. It's crazy but the only plausible option I see right now is for 10 GOP moderates to back Hakeem Jeffries.

FrustratedMonky• 3 years ago

Wasn't Gaetz the one that took underage girls across state lines? Is this the guy Republican's want to follow?

readthenotes1• 3 years ago

There wasn't enough evidence to bring any charges. Apparently, the witnesses weren't credible enough.

Doesn't mean he didn't do it, but doesn't mean he did.

westcort• 3 years ago

He was let go based on his political position. The Venmo transactions look more than a little incriminating: https://www.thedailybeast.com/gaetz-paid-accused-sex-traffic...

GiorgioG• 3 years ago

I wish I could not do my job (collectively all of Congress) and somehow manage to keep it until I die.

0xDEF• 3 years ago

The anti-NATO pro-Russian wing of the Republican party becoming increasingly dominant sends a worrying message across the Atlantic especially to the Baltic countries.

Honestly at this point I don't see any other option than the Baltic countries developing nuclear weapons.

xeromal4• 3 years ago

Yeah, from an American perspective, I wouldn't take comfort in continued support from the US to save Ukraine and others. There's a good chance funding will dry up in 45 days.

dang2• 3 years ago

Ordinary political articles like this one are off-topic for HN. Please see https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.

Some political overlap can be ok, but for an article to be a good HN submission, the high-order bit needs to be intellectual curiosity.

In case anyone wants more explanation, I've written extensively about how we moderate political stories on HN: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so....

Edit: Here are a couple examples:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22902490 (April 2020)

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21607844 (Nov 2019)

and some related points:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23959679 (July 2020)

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17014869 (May 2018)

zzzeek2• 3 years ago

OK, I will keep this in mind, however what's different about this particular political story is that it's also extremely historic, nothing like this has ever occurred in the history of the US and this is the first speaker to ever be removed in this way; at the very least this kind of instability can have impacts on things like financial markets. I would not share a simply political story like how Joe Biden is doing in the polls are something, that's clearly a stupid story.

quesera2• 3 years ago

I'd say it's "historic" but it's not important. It will roil markets less than a shutdown would, and that story would not be particularly HN-worthy either.

Sometimes I wish there was a way to designate some posts "off topic" but still be visible on the front page -- like a topical Jubilee Day. I'm genuinely interested in what some of the HN crowd think about (some of) the non-tech, non-intellectually-curious stuff that goes on in the world.

But I suspect that we'd all just turn out to be dopey ignoramuses, opining well beyond our knowledge, and the discussion would devolve into the same canned narrative crap that we see everywhere else.

HN probably has nothing to contribute to the discussion, and policing that line through downvotes and flagging is almost certainly the prophylaxis that keeps the infection at bay. Alas.

dang2• 3 years ago

I hear you, but I don't think it's possible for an HN thread about it not to just disintegrate into partisan bits, and nasty ones at that.

(btw, if you emailed recently, I'm sorry I haven't had a chance to answer yet - it's just the inbox doing its brutal thing. if that wasn't you, please ignore.)

elfbargpt• 3 years ago

Politics aside, there is one mechanical aspect about this I find interesting. Basically if you have a majority vote split down party lines, all it takes is a small group (size greater than the difference between majority and minority parties) to wield quite a lot of influence. Gaetz seems like he's calling the shots in this gambit. I guess this has always been true, but interesting to watch it play out.

matthewfelgate• 3 years ago

I suspect that the Democrats may regret not intervening when McCarthy was ousted, especially if, in the coming weeks, the Speaker job ends up with a more right-leaning candidate.

Kevin McCarthy ousted as speaker in Republican-led House

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