These are people Al, who when they put one foot forward, have absolutely no clear idea of what to do with the other one Drowned Hopes Donald E Westlake
Things are simmering along nicely in the GOP House Speaker Disaster Stew pot. Serial chickensh*t wrestling coach Jim Jordan did the next to impossible. He made Kevin McCarthy feel like a winner by losing his speaker bid by one vote more than McCarthy lost by in his first ballot. And in fact, it’s even worse than that for Jordan. Jordan lost the vote by 20 votes, all GOP. Two weeks ago, when Bratty Matty Gaetz engineered McCarthy’s demise, McCarthy only lost by eight votes! come on Bratty Matty, Who’s yo daddy? Former Squeaker Cave-In McCarthy, that’s who!
Things are moving right along. After the first ballot, Jim Jordan, who figured why only have one cheek aching and sore when he can get both cheeks kicked in the same day, scheduled a second balloting round for 6 p.m. ET. But after a couple of hours crawling around on all fours behind closed doors, while caucus members hurled Milk Bones at him to no avail, he called off the vote tonight. It’s now scheduled for 11 a.m. tomorrow.
And if things go as I think they will, with Jordan actually losing another 8-15 votes instead of making up ground, it’s over. Jordan will slink away with his tail between his legs, and the whole thing is dead in the water. Gaetz, Jordan, Machine Gun Margie and the rest of those mental defectives have nobody they can trust who can get 217 GOP votes. And as long as they block GOP moderates who try to do it with GOP votes alone, everything stops. And the only alternative is to work with Democrats on a consensus caretaker Speaker for the next 14 months, with a power sharing agreement. The death shot for the Freedom Caucus. And they know it.
Also, they have a sneaky little fix in mind. There have been a few 10 gallon hints dropped today, and after Jordan gets waxed tomorrow, it’s going to be going out over loudspeakers and bullhorns. But just like almost everything else in Trumptopia, it’s a con, and highly likely unconstitutional.
Here’s the plan. The House already has a Speaker Pro Tem appointed to fill in. His name is Patrick McHenry, He’s been around almost as long as Nancy Pelosi, and is a solid, moderate old school conservative. Which is why they appointed him, he’s highly unlikely to try to pull any quick moves. Which would be difficult since Speaker Pro Tem is a largely ceremonial post, with no legislative authority.
Which is what the GOP is conniving to fix. In control of the House, the GOP wants to try to pull off a rules change that for 30 days would give the Speaker Pro Tem the power to run the House, including bringing bills to the floor. The logic, which will only work on imbeciles like the GOP caucus, is to allow McHenry to bring up bills for Israel and Ukraine support, and either negotiate a budget or extension, or get a long term continuing resolution. The hook is that this will allow the House to deal with the critical stuff while giving the House of Misfit Toys more time to get their sh*t together.
As far as cons go, it’s not bad, mainly because it’s KISS. Here’s how it would work. McCarthy and Biden already took the debt ceiling off the table until January of 2025. If they can get aid to Israel and Ukraine done, and either negotiate a long term extension of the current budget agreement, or sign a long term continuing resolution until after the 2024 election, then everything else is moot.
Because once the immediate heat is off, who cares how long, or even if they elect a new Speaker? It’s not like they’re interested in legislating, and next year is an election year. Chaos is the only thing the Teahadists care about anyway, so it’s a win-win for these safely gerrymandered losers.
There’s just one small problem. The plan is almost certainly unconstitutional. Rules are something that the party in power in the House pass at the start of a term to lay out the ground rules for running committees and the floor, including the way that bills are called to the floor for a vote. But those rules are only in effect for a functional House, with a duly elected Speaker of the House.
But the Speaker of the House of Representatives is not a committee or floor operation of the House. The Speaker is a constitutionally defined position. And guess what? The duties and responsibilities of the Speaker are laid out in the Constitution. If the founding fathers had wanted the Speaker Pro Tem to have the ability to call legislation to the floor, they would have put it in writing! In fact, I’m pretty sure that the founding fathers made the Speaker Pro Tem position a toothless tiger specifically to keep unscrupulous politicians from trying to use it to their own advantage.
If they actually try this stunt, I find it almost inconceivable that the House Parliamentarian would not shoot it down as being outside the permissive parameters to the rules. And if the GOP tries to do it anyway by overruling the Parliamentarian, then the Democrats would immediately file a lawsuit in court, asking for a temporary restraining order until its sorted out. And either way, the delay almost certainly vaults past the 31 day limit, and the government shuts down.
Ladies and gentlemen, this is what true desperation looks like when you mix it with criminal stupidity and a reliance on a quick con as the way out of any problem. Oh well, tomorrow will be here soon enough, and so will the following days. We shall see.
You raise one hell of an interesting point, and it escaped me when I wrote about McHenry and thirty days earlier today. The Constitution itself is quite broad on the main point that the House shall choose a Speaker. However, later on in Article One it says each house (Senate and House) shall determine their own rules. (for how they will conduct their business) Those rules have gotten ever more detailed over time. But one aspect that’s cemented in precedent is that a Speaker Pro Tempore has as you say quite limited powers. In fact, he/she can gavel the House into session but the ONLY business (according to those pesky rules) that can be conducted is debate on and voting on selecting who will be Speaker.
Now we get into the weeds. It’s one helluva technical issue and how the Parliamentarian would rule is an open question but changing the rules of the House for this or any other Congress falls outside the scope of choosing a new Speaker! LOTS of rules as I said. But we’re talking about the one that has long defined the role of a Speaker Pro Tempore. So the question becomes “Is changing the rules to allow limited broader powers to a Speaker Pro Tempore allowed IF it’s for the purpose of selecting a Speaker, even for a limited time frame with still limited powers?”
Wow. I don’t know and I’ll bet Constitutional lawyers that have deep knowledge of the workings of Congress would argue this back and forth all night long! And if it goes to court? My oh my what a mess THAT will be and John Roberts would have a cow over the thought of SCOTUS having to weigh in on this which of course would wind up being the case.
However, as I pointed out this afternoon there apparently ARE some Republicans that Democrats would find acceptable for this thirty day thing, and not just Liz Cheney who would be as much of a non-starter for Republicans as Hakeem Jeffries would be to every Republican. So, I wouldn’t necessarily say this little trick is dead in the water. What would be truly ironic is if a REPUBLICAN were to blow it up and force a ruling from the Parliamentarian. Not that that official can’t be overruled but just as with picking a Speaker the GOP can only afford less than a handful of defections.
Well, it’s pretty cool you spotted this issue. It’s going to be interesting as hell for sure. But at least tonight I might be able to get a decent night’s rest knowing not only is Gym HE GROPED ME COACH! Joran still not Speaker, that (as you say) if anything he’s lost ground and is unlikely to have the votes come 11am tomorrow.
“If the founding fathers had wanted the Speaker Pro Tem to have the ability to call legislation to the floor, they would have put it in writing!”
It wouldn’t have mattered. The Founders put a lot of things “in writing” that have been swept by the wayside over the years.
Article I, Section 2: “The Number of Representatives shall not exceed one for every thirty Thousand, but each State shall have at Least one Representative; . . . ” (We have 435 representatives so, by this formula, the US population should be a whopping 13,050,000 yet we have some 25 times that number. In fact, when 435 was set as the maximum number–allowing for temporary increases to allow for the admission of new states–the country’s population was approximately 120 million. That was in 1929 and was set by the “Permanent Apportionment Act rather than a Constitutional Amendment.)
Amendment II: “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” (The US Supreme Court, in the course of several decisions, has effectively stated that “A well-regulated militia” is NOT germane to possession of “arms”; in fact, they’ve gone so far as to determine that “well-regulated” doesn’t actually mean “regulated” in any standard sense of the word whether simple registration or licensing of owners or someone’s having a criminal record.)
That’s just two. As we’ve seen from so many of our “originalists” SCOTUS members in the last 20 years, whatever the Founders “original” sentiments may have been, their actual intent and meaning only matter if and when they coincide with right-wing principles.
Who chose the Parliamentarian for this session?
To the best of my knowledge, the Parliamentarians, both Houe and Senate are chosen by bipartisan consensus. And they can go on from term to term as long as they aren’t removed until their term expires…