What we are witnessing with Kevin McCarthy’s losing bid to be Speaker of the House is how utterly and completely Trump and the behind-the-scenes backers of MAGA & ‘Freedom Caucus’ have broken the GOP.
The party of “law and order” is about to seat chaos agents and criminals in
the 118th U.S. Congress.
It has, of course, devolved into such a state of dysfunction that it cannot currently chose a leader after narrowly winning a majority in the midterms.
The current state of the GOP reminds me of Atlantic City after Trump basically bankrupted and abandoned his properties.
What you see in the faces of it’s members now has the same doom and salty air to it that blew through the abandoned Trump Plaza Hotel & Casino that sat on its boardwalk.
Another effect of the rot of moral abandonment is that you see how cheaply things were made in the first place.
You can see this is in the faded shadows of the cheap concrete and fake gold letters rusting where they once stuck to the facade, advertising a sort of false hope for prosperity and glamour.
Upon close inspection revealing itself to be a cheap imitation of actual quality and progress.
I remember back in 2015 when Trump was still in the Republican primary, that long summer of deceit in which he bullied his way by insult and obscene boast to the top of the ticket.
I was working as a road manager for Stephen Stills and on tour with CSN.
Stills had decided he wanted to head east, ahead of the rest of the band after a show in Chicago.
Our next show was in Atlantic City; instead of flying we decided to take the tour bus since there was a few days to spare.
We watched a lot of the coverage of the GOP debates before crashing out in our bunks for the long ride.
After pulling onto the side street of Caesar’s Palace (after about 17 hours on the road) our trusty bus driver, Em, said, ‘we’re here boys’.
As the bus door opened and Stephen and I alighted, I noticed Trump Plaza just up the block.
It had been recently closed and seemed to instantly fall into the sort of pallor of dereliction that seemed to be sweeping many cities, where corrupt policies and greedy developers had left their mark.
I looked at the empty building, Trump’s name emblazoned on the top like a giant billboard for failure and said to Stills “see that Stephen, that’s what the rest of the U.S. will look like if Trump becomes president…”
That memory came back to me yesterday as I watched the chaos play out and saw the blank eyes and yawns of the latest GOP grifters ready to take their place in the carnival, having arrived to the parade on a float of lies.
Thankfully that is all tempered by the steady leadership and progress of the Biden administration.
The infrastructure bill that the Democrats and outgoing Speaker Nancy Pelosi got passed, along with 10.5 million new jobs and 3.5% unemployment (which is near a 50 year low), pre-pandemic levels for Black & Hispanic Americans.
Combine this with manufacturing jobs recovering quickly (faster than any business cycle since 1953) and 185 billion dollars in infrastructure projects, and the President’s expectation of 3.5 trillion dollars in public and private sector investment over the next decade.
That’s all good news for lowering inflation and boosting our economy - two things the Republicans always pretended to be the party that cared most about.
Instead they devolved into chaos and kleptocracy, while a mad king and an heir apparent in Ron DeSantis, hang out in their Florida redoubts planning the next coup.
The Koch Brothers were the first big backers of now Governor Ron DeSantis; back when David Koch was still alive and heading up the family’s political operations a meeting was hard to come by, yet DeSantis requested and was granted one as a junior Congressman.
The audacious young fascist impressed them enough to earn their backing.
It is yet another one of the political investments, carried on today by Charles Koch, that have paid off in dividends. Not simply the chaos playing out in the GOP Congress (which benefits them by weakening government itself, a central tenet of the ‘Freedom Caucus’) but also in what is happening in Florida.
Governor DeSantis is now gutting public education in his state and hand-picked the newly retired Senator Ben Sasse to take over as president of Florida’s third largest university.
A public institution where the curriculum will now be chosen by men who see a lack of diversity as a virtue. DeSantis has been essentially trying to make up his own version of American history.
It’s just one step in the ‘anti-woke’ campaign that has been seeded by billionaires for decades and made the centerpiece of reactionary DeSantis’s agenda.
The more ignorant and primed with nationalistic and ethnic toxicity, the more malleable the public become as voters.
The grift also becomes much more lucrative for those who are pulling the strings.
Much of this chaos and corruption came into its own after the ‘Citizens United’ SCOTUS decision.
It’s ironic that Mitch McConnell, such a fan of unlimited funding for political campaigns, is being bitten in the ass a little bit by the monsters he helped create.
It is no accident that McConnell finds himself alongside Biden today in Kentucky to celebrate a bridge that will be rebuilt - thanks to the progress of Democrats, the results of an actual effective legislative process and real leadership.
Expect more progress from the Democrats in 2023, and more chaos from the GOP.
Having lost his 5th vote for Speaker it is hard to see how McCarthy ends up doing anything other than stepping aside.
Let’s hope whomever takes his place is willing to work on behalf of the American people instead of a party held hostage by radicals and insurrectionists.
Both of which Kevin himself courted to fulfill a dream that will now never come true.
A man who stood for nothing except his own ambitons is essentially hoisted on his own petard.
His lack of any clear morality or legislative agenda other than his own grasp on power, will in the end, have his dreams die because they were not rooted in the very things our system of government represents.
History will not be kind to Kevin McCarty, neither will the GOP.
Here’s to a Happy New Year and brighter days ahead.
I forced myself to read through everything that happened there. The detailed stuff, the media largely covered the drama on the floor. It's long, boring and I don't suggest. AOC did give a good detailed analysis prior to the last vote on her IG if anyone wants it.
What I got is in their rush to make gains the R's House ended up hobbling themselves and their ability to achieve their aims from now to 24. Like they apparently plan all this for a year, which means they should have been ready going in. When the opportunity presented itself they jumped at it and tossed out things they wanted for a long time, aside leap frogging for positions, but didn't really think the logistics through.
They got "some" things but much else just stumped themselves. Also the D's got a LOT of information about them and their party relations they couldn't figure out before which is advantageous to them and syncs with the D's new media outreach plans (which are pretty good imo).
Last, Gaetz voting for Trump put the rest in a bad position particularly with MAGA, NAR, so on where they were forced publicly to NOT vote for him. Now I see in the clusters they are being labelled RINO's or "Uniparty" is the new phrase. So they all have a mess on their hands to say the least. Careful what you wish for, you just might get it I suppose.
Brilliant writing, as always, Noel. Thank you ❤️