Mark down today on your calendar as yet another lemming rush over the cliff for the GOP, this time by Kevin McCarthy. McCarthy is unwisely contradicting Nancy Pelosi’s edict that House members and staff wear masks on the premises. He spews a convenient factoid, but when he gets to the QAnon dog whistle, boom. That’s it, a bridge too far.
And here’s Kevin McCarthy using a Qanon catch phrase. This is madness. https://t.co/G5XMOdXeNv
— Molly Jong-Fast (@MollyJongFast) July 29, 2021
This is the same Kevin McCarthy who claimed months ago that he never heard of QAnon and wasn’t quite sure how to even pronounce its name.
What this does is mark one more departure of the GOP from sane and standard practices and yet another step in the direction of the cracker factory. There are two separate Republican parties right now, what’s left of the old school and those who choose to embrace conspiracy theory as a platform. Even Mitch McConnell is taking personal steps in Kentucky, paying for radio ads to promote COVID vaccination, while his opposite number in the House chooses to identify with the Qrazies.
McCarthy must think that this is what’s going to keep him in power. Like McConnell, he thinks of nothing else, but unlike McConnell, McCarthy apparently thinks that the QAnons comprise enough of the party to where it makes sense to toxify the entire party, not to mention poison the political narrative generally speaking, by identifying with them. I think this is a choice he will live to regret.
McCarthy is going full bore Trump and QAnon. That may be the decision that washes him out of politics. He should have stayed with his initial posture, which was that Trump bore responsibility for inciting the insurrection. But he couldn’t, for reasons known only to himself, and that’s when he tossed aside the mantle of leadership.
The GOP is trying to rebuild. The fact that the Trump-endorsed candidate in Texas lost her primary a few days ago to an old school Republican is the handwriting on the wall. McCarthy can’t see it apparently. The far right faction of the party is too extreme to maintain any real power for too long. Maybe that is what the message of 2022 will be.
I keep wondering if both he and Lindsey Graham are being held hostage to blackmail by the orange one. When they “act up”, i.e. tell the truth, he threatens them?
Definitely, Rainyj. Li’l Lindsey Lickspittle’s been lost for a long time, thanks to whatever dirt The Donald has on him, now McCarthy’s bent over for more of the same. They haven’t figured out what Michael Cohen told them under oath: no matter what they do for their idol, he’ll turn on them eventually. Their dirty secrets are no way safe.
Still applicable.
Everything Trump touches, dies.
You would think that McCarthy would understand how the House rules work. He’s been there long enough.
In Pelosi’s words, McCarthy is a moron…
I always thought he was, and every time he opens his mouth, he proves it over and over.
Abraham Lincoln – Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and to remove all doubt.