comment: >
  
  There is no plan b that the entire GOP caucus will rally around. Now that the freedom caucus has a taste of power they won’t give it up. They have no legislative agenda. They just want power.
context: What is happening in the House is a complete shitshow. I have no idea what the endgame is. Maybe McCarthy has to withdraw and the GOP has to nominate someone else. 
  McCarthy just lost vote No. 4. Here comes No. 5.
  Edit: Here comes Vote No. 6.
  Edit: Vote No. 6 will fail. No. 7 or adjournment until tomorrow?
  Edit: Adjourned until 8 PM ET tonight.
  Edit: CNN reports McCarthy doesn’t think vote tonight would be “productive”; “No deal yet.”
  Edit: House votes to adjourn for tonight. They will reconvene at 12 noon ET tomorrow.
  Edit: Day 3 of this circus. Send in the clowns. Don’t bother. They’re here.
  Edit: Boebert is hinting she may nominate Trump for Speaker, per Newsweek article.
  Edit: The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a new result. Here comes Vote No. 7.
  Edit: Here comes No. 8. Will it have the same result as the previous 7? That’s what I’m expecting.
  Edit: Number 9. Number 9. Number 9. Bueller? Bueller? Bueller?
  Edit: The Bo Derek vote for No. 10.
  Edit: McCarthy on his way to Defeat No. 11.
  Edit: McCarthy goes down for the 11th time, sort of like a hooker on a Friday night. House now voting whether or not to adjourn.
  Edit: Adjourned until Noon ET tomorrow for another episode of this shitshow. >
  
  The Freedom Caucus hates Kevin McCarthy and wants to humiliate him. That's ultimately the reason this is happening. 
  It probably won't stop until McCarthy steps down or Trump forces the 20 dissenters to give in (he has endorsed McCarthy and reiterated his support earlier today.) >
  
  Why does the Freedom caucus hate McCarthy so much? >
  
  They want some pretty extensive changes to the House rules that McCarthy isn't interested in implementing. They also feel that McCarthy has promoted moderates over more extreme right wing candidates in primaries and they want him to commit to stopping. >
  
  They want more of the candidates that lost them the mid-terms? >
  
  They aren't interested in maintaining political power the "traditional" way. >
  
  Or maybe by more "traditional" ways if you go back far enough. >
  
  Getting so conservative you bring back feudalism. >
  
  Don’t worry, if we just keep getting more conservative through the medieval ages; we  can eventually end up going all the way back to Greco Roman democracy! >
  
  
  All 212 Democrats voted for their own leader, Jeffries, but six Republicans would have to cross party lines for Jeffries to win the Speaker's position. That appears very unlikely to happen.
  
  Not necessarily. In order to win the Speakership the person needs to get a majority of members voting, not of all members. So if 12 Republicans abstain from voting and all the Democrats remain united then Jeffries would win. I don't think there's any chance this will happen, but I wanted to point out that it's technically possible. >
  
  
  So if 12 Republicans abstain from voting and all the Democrats
  
  I'm glad VVilly pointed this out. I have asking myself the same question for two days. I don't think it is terribly underhanded to make a deal with 12 freshmen Republicans to vote present in exchange for choice committee appointments.
  What a disaster the Republican party is right now. >
  
  No one in the GOP is going to do that.  They would be pariahs to their party and be primaried in 2024.  
  The best scenario for the Dems would be them agreeing with a handful of moderate GOP members to vote for someone in the GOP to the left of McCarthy.  Someone who would agree to not do some of the dumber grandstanding like voting for Biden's impeachment or something. >
  
  
  They would be pariahs to their party and be primaried in 2024.
  
  I wonder if any R reps are close to retirement and wouldn't care.  Or maybe someone would promise them a sweet gig in the private sector, like Paul Ryan going to Fox.  The old-boys-network may be working hard to wipe out MAGA. >
  
  I don't see it.  Most people don't retire from this job unless they're literally drooling on themselves.  Most of these guys are not Paul Ryan and are not going to get the status and money in the private sector that they get in Congress. >
  
  Eh, I think it's more that most everybody who had principles and would be willing to do it voted to impeach Trump after Jan 6 and got ejected from the party and congress. >
  
  Freedom Caucus will try to leverage as much out of McCarthy as possible. He has no real counter leverage, so it becomes "how shamelessly will this group hurt norms for their gains"- So how shamelessly will the Freedom Caucus flaunt disrupting norms for gains is the answer. >
  
  McCarthy's counter leverage is letting this play out in the media/news.  As the longer this drags/plays out the worse it looks in the eyes of the public. >
  
  And that helps McCarthy how exactly? >
  
  He can use it to pressure them into voting for him. >
  
  So far the opposite is happening. >
  
  Didn't say it would work. >
  
  Honestly, no one. Speaker of the House is a chamber-wide vote among all members. The Republicans are the majority, but they're so broken and dysfunctional that they can't even come together to use that majority power to elect a Speaker.
  They've elected and enabled bomb-throwers, and so they have bomb-throwers, not statesmen. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. >
  
  it's basically the same thing that Simena and Manchin have been doing in the Senate for years. Granted, by themselves, they can't grind the Senate to a halt like the Freedom Caucus has for the House, but it's similar in that they can demand huge concessions from the party they're supposedly a part of.
  When you're in the minority, it's easy to vote for your leader because you know there's nothing to gain and everything to lose by not presenting a united front
  But when you're in the majority and you get a taste of what it's like to be the spoiler, then things start going wild.
  I predict even if McCarthy gets his gavel, there'll be so many defectors that they can't get anything done, or he has to give away so much that the rest of his caucus won't agree to the terms. Instead of Manchin and Simena, McCarthy is going to have a room full of 200 spoilers ... >
  
  I'd say it's fundamentally different. The bomb-throwers in the House are in absolutely no risk of being primaried or losing a general election. They're in safe deep-red districts.
  Machin and Sinema are among the most vulnerable Democrats in the Senate. >
  
  I would venture that neither of them will be their states Senator next term. >
  
  Sinema is cooked. 
  West Virginia is extremely quirky, so no one knows what happens with Manchin. Last time I was in Charleston, there were yard signs thanking Manchin for standing against Democrats. >
  
  Manchin and Sinema aren't comparable imo. Sinema represents a more progressive district than her voting record and her behavior has been more erratic and dishonest. Manchin, in contrast, represents a blood red district and has been more consistent in behavior than Sinema.
  Basically, Democrats should be thankful they have anyone to work with from West Virginia, but have a real gripe that Arizona resulted in Sinema. >
  
  Sinema straight up betrayed the people who supported her campaign.
  Manchin being a Democrat due to WV’s historical quirks straight up saved Biden’s legislative agenda. Without him as the 50th vote, none of it would’ve passed.
  If Democrats want to be angry at anyone, Sara Gideon and Cal Cunningham blew totally winnable races in 2020. 
  Amy McGrath deserves a dishonorable mention for soaking up over $100MM on an obviously futile senate race against Mitch McConnell. >
  
  
  my McGrath deserves a dishonorable mention for soaking up over $100MM on an obviously futile senate race against Mitch McConnell.
  
  What in god's name was the DSCC thinking sending her so much money? >
  
  It was mostly money her campaign  grifted from donors with digital ads that played on hatred of McConnell and were misleading about the reality of the race. >
  
  Ah that makes more sense. Playin upon the false hope of seeing another Daschle/Cantor situation. >
  
  I could see Scalise being the Speaker since he's loved by Freedom Caucus?
  However I feel like this is a sign of things to come since GOP can't even agree on a Speaker. >
  
  A vote for Scalise is likely coming soon.  He'll get more votes than Biggs/Jordan/Donalds, but a substantial number of moderate Republicans will not vote for him and he'll end up with less than the \~202 McCarthy has been getting.  Then we're right back to where we started. >
  
  I'd be curious if that's the case. >
  
  As a life long republican all I can say is I’m disappointed in the idiots in the so called  freedom caucus.  I live in Ralph Normans district and called the county GOP chair last night.  My message was clear, I’ll vote Democratic in 2024 and will be donating the money I typically give to the local party to the libertarians if Norman is our nominee. 
  At this point I’m actually okay with 6 Republicans voting for Jeffries.  A democratic speaker and a republican majority would at least get the house functioning again.  
  No caucus should be able to hold the house hostage like this.  It’s not what I voted for and I’m more than a little pissed off at these people claiming to be conservative while basically trying to blackmail the GOP.  
  Vote against the 20 is the best choice in 2024. >
  
  Out of curiosity, do you think if enough the voters living in moderate republican districts call their reps they can potentially get them to vote for Jeffries or at least abstain? >
  
  Not a chance.  While I would not mind; most Republicans even the most moderate will not vote for the democratic leader.  Nor by the way will democrats cross the aisle to vote for McCarthy.  No at some point the republicans will bow to the pressure and elect a speaker.  
  Some, a very small number, like me would be okay with a cross party vote, but less than 1 or 2 percent.  The other 98% of the base would lose their mind at the betrayal.  I’d say a similar percentage of democrat voters would support an cross party vote. >
  
  I bet a good number of Republicans would vote for Jeffries if the vote was silent. >
  
  Maybe, and maybe a good number of Democrats would vote for McCarthy if the vote was silent.  That’s a hypothetical without any substance.  
  Politicians are party faithful for the most part.  I don’t see them crossing the aisle.  I might want them too in this case because I’m pissed at these 20 RINOs blackmailing moflicks.  But it’s hard to imagine a scenario where that happens.
  What is likely to happen is a compromise Republican speaker is elected and then the GOP starts punishing the 20.  Not as bad as the democrats punished James Traficant but then he did the unthinkable and actually crossed the aisle and voted for the other party for speaker.
  Still the 20 republicans holding up this congress will pay, the GOP will just be crafty in how they extract that payment. >
  
  What we are witnessing is the death of the modern republican party.
  Republicans shifted to obstructionism over governance in the 1990s with newt gingrich, and then doubled down on this strategy in the 2010s in response to Obama and because it had for the past decades up to that point served their interest well.
  Then came Trump.
  Trump embolded the hardliner right wing base with his rhetoric and forever made them loyal to him. At the same time, Trump also pretty much solidified the polarization divide in american society and more or less turned everyone who is not with trump against him. Those who didn't overtly express support of Trump also were dismissed as against Trump by his base...a with us or against us mentality if you will.
  Republicans liked this because it represented a doubling down of obstructionism with the sweet chefs kiss of pissing the libs off, and they mistakenly interpreted it as a renewal of their version of republicanism instead of what it actually was - the death throes of their party.
  What has happened since Trump lost? He didn't actually recognize it, and attempted a coup. With anyone speaking out against trump excommunicated, republicans defended Trumps actions, turning off even more people and even flipping some. Then came the midterms, and almost every republican candidate that was a hardliner in a swing district or embraced by trump in a swing district lost. In fact, the midterms were historically bad.
  So now the GOP is stuck in this position where they have fostered the hardliners and obstructionist in their party so much that the far right have taken those tactics that they've used against democrats in the past to push their agend, and are using it against the moderates in their own party. So now the republicans are eating themselves.
  There's no where for them to go. If they moderate themselves, then they get called RINOs by the base. If they don't moderate themselves, they alienate anyone not aligned with them in the swing districts that decide congressional majorities, and they fail to actually gain a majority and push an agenda - that is to say if they even had an agenda to begin with which they haven't since 2016. 
  Look at what happened to mike pence, liz cheney, and now Desantis. Desnatis is the best shot forward for republicans and people are questioning if he can even win with Trump still in the picture.
  Republicanism has to collapse and reshape itself into either a new compromise that is agreeable to it's current coalition, or reshape itself in a way that begins to pull away historic democrat voters. I don't know what that winning combo is - it's not my job to figure that out that's what D.C. analyst are for. All I know, is that this isn't sustainable for them. There is no Post-Trump GOP that can exist. >
  
  The US could easily support a "family values" pro worker style party, the majority of the country is still religious, has "traditional" values, and thinks that working should be a virtue that pays well. A good chunk of those people are currently Democrats.  
  Not that I think that is likely to happen, American politics is wild and the die-hard Trump train section has wrangled control of the wheel. >
  
  
  The US could easily support a "family values" pro worker style party, the majority of the country is still religious, has "traditional" values, and thinks that working should be a virtue that pays well. A good chunk of those people are currently Democrats. 
  
  This doesn't happen so long as right-leaning media sources convinces and enlists vulnerable and gullible Americans into their culture war business. >
  
  Capitalists are going to capitalist; it's just what they do.
  If the left thinks it's worth making enemies with social conservatives in the culture war, they're going to lose the class war, as we're currently witnessing. >
  
  I was hoping someone would ask this. Since the Speaker does not need to be a member of the House, I think they should move to external candidates who could be seen as positive by voters for both sides. So I think it should be Dolly Parton. >
  
  She has way too much dignity to ever be fooled into taking that job >
  
  Too bad.  Also too much honesty to ever get voted in even if she wanted the job. >
  
  Indeed. Same deal with Michelle Obama and the presidency. >
  
  If they don't make George Santos the speaker then this country just isn't any fun anymore. >
  
  I understand Santos was previously Speaker of the House for Reagan amd again for W based on his bio, so it just makes sense. >
  
  Given that he was President for two terms after W though would he be eligible for a role in the line of succession? >
  
  The one R with House experience who has proven to unite the GOP: 
  Madison Cawthorne
  /s >
  
  In a way, though, this is every conservative politician's dream; Just keep re-running the election until you get the results you want. >
  
  I honestly don't think there is a downside to this for the GOP. At some point, I would imagine the GOP and right wing news outlets will pivot to blaming the "do nothing Democrats" for the lack of a Speaker. >
  
  I suspect that the Republicans will not unify behind a candidate for speaker until a moderate Republican gives a vote to the Democrats. 
  Then the Republicans will recognize that they need to compromise on a leader.