Fun Times At The Chaos Party
Plus, the 'Gaetz 8' and Lindsey Graham's indelicate AI moment
Observers such as yours truly are in a bind. We want our country to be a functioning Democracy with at least two viable political parties that are operationally sound and serious in their purpose.
For decades, the prevailing wisdom was that Democrats fall in love (i.e. follow their hearts), while Republicans fall in line. Democrats often nominated newcomers to run for president, while Republicans coronated whomever was next in line. GOPers were often seen as the institutionalists who, if nothing else, held an abiding respect for tradition.
At least for the time being, such is no longer the case. The Republican Party is now officially a sad joke, and we can only hope it’s a temporary condition. To be fair, the nucleus of the dysfunction is mostly in (though not limited to) the House of Representatives, where Speaker Kevin McCarthy was deposed late Tuesday by a handful of members of his own party led by Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz (pronounced gates). The gaggle of rogue lawmakers has been dubbed by Wall Street Journal columnist Daniel Henninger as the “Gaetz Eight.” (free link)
.jpg){kind=link}
As I wrote last week, McCarthy was either blind or foolish in the first place to agree to the condition that a single member could move to replace him and call a vote to do so. And he has paid for it. As expected, all Democrats present voted to remove the speaker. The principal reason those eight Republicans did: McCarthy agreed to work with Democrats to avert the shutdown of the federal government through a 45-day continuing resolution. In other words, he avoided the Seinfeld Shutdown.
Most Republicans in the House are horrified. The factional move reflects poorly on them and is a disservice to the nation. There is now a substantial minority of House members who are simply not serious people. To be sure, there are some Democrats among that cohort (certain members of The Squad come to mind), but currently the problem lies primarily in the GOP.
People like Gaetz, Lauren Boebert, Marjorie Taylor Greene and Louie Gohmert are about as unserious as they come. Here are some more, in case you’re interested. Another, Jim Jordan, has thrown his hat into the ring to be speaker. These folks aren’t really interested in policy or in governing. They want to be influencers who get their faces on television, bask in Twitter and YouTube adoration and fundraise off of the outrage of the day. Substack colleague Ken Tingley has also suggested Trump sycophant Elise Stefanik, a congresswoman who represents a New York district adjacent to mine, has been mentioned as a potential speaker candidate.
We’re way past the point where, as put into words this morning by Peter Baker of the NYT, “There was a time, not that long ago, when the United States presumed to teach the world how it was done. When it held itself up as a model of a stable, predictable democracy.”
To further prove the point that we’re not “stable” and “predictable” and — inasmuch as the speaker does not need to be a member of the House (though some say otherwise) — Greene went on Alex Jones’ Infowars to propose making former President Donald Trump speaker:
Trump is a poor manager to begin with, so how on earth could he run the House while fending off dozens of criminal indictments, civil law suits that threaten his business empire, and running for president? If we needed more evidence of MTG’s frivolity, we have surely seen it here. Besides, late word is that Trump has endorsed Jordan, a former college wrestling coach of questionable repute.
Neoconservative writer and never-Trumper Bill Kristol had another notion:
P.S. Look for a moment at what this sitting United States Senator said about Gaetz:
Sen. Markwayne Mullin on Matt Gaetz: “We had all seen the videos he was showing on the House floor … of the girls that he had slept with. He’d brag about how he would crush ED medicine and chase it with an energy drink so he could go all night.” Gaetz responds: “This is a lie”
Minding Menendez’s Money
Is there any better spectator sport than old-fashioned graft? I’m talking, of course, about Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez. In a scathing federal indictment last week, federal prosecutors charged that “the New Jersey Democrat accepted cash, gold and other benefits in exchange for using his office to enrich three businessmen and aid the Egyptian government,” according to the Wall Street Journal. (free link)
Investigators found $480,000 in cash and more than $100,000 worth of gold bars at Menendez's home. And get this: “After getting home from an unofficial-turned-sanctioned trip to Egypt in October 2021, [Menendez] searched on Google: “how much is one kilo of gold worth.” I couldn’t do better than that if I were writing a screenplay.
Much of the cash was stuffed into his fancy suits. In a move that must have made his lawyers cringe, the senator held a news conference and insisted the dough had accumulated through periodic withdrawals from his own accounts — actions he said he took because his ancestors’ bank assets had been subject to confiscations by authorities in communist Cuba. On top of everything else, he’s playing the Latino card …
Menendez had managed beat a previous indictment, but this case looks much stronger and will be fun to watch. No cryptocurrency transfers or fancy vacations for this crook. Just gold and greenbacks.
Senator A.I. Graham
Finally, I encountered the video below earlier this week on the social media platform formerly known as Twitter. It is so disturbing that I made a screen recording because I was afraid it would be taken down.
On one level, it is funny because Sen. Lindsey Graham is an easy target of comic-book proportions. But it’s a stark reminder of what artificial intelligence is capable of producing. This is incredibly well done, which is precisely what makes it so dangerous in the wrong hands.
You might need to turn up the volume.
Further reading:
My latest for CTNewsJunkie.com regarding a competitive race for Connecticut’s only swing congressional district — the one I live in:
In Effort To Unseat Hayes, Logan Finds Himself In A Tight Spot
Liz Cheney’s Ominous Warning About Jim Jordan’s House Speaker Bid - Newsweek