Kevin McCarthy becomes the first speaker to ever be successfully ousted in a motion to vacate vote. One day, you can tell your grandchildren you were alive to witness this completely pointless bit of history.
Matt Gaetz’s self-aggrandizing political stunt makes no sense and changes nothing — other than perhaps his fundraising totals. And other than some platitudinous blathering about “the establishment” and “the uniparty,” I still haven’t seen anyone offer a coherent reason — even ex post facto — for how any of this is the “best way to advance the conservative agenda.”
It would be one thing, perhaps an admirable thing, if Gaetz had gone on this crusade for a coherent ideological or principled reason. But his post-ousting demagoguery and grandstanding about issues completely unrelated to McCarthy’s job performance proved it was a personal matter.
“I don’t think voting against Kevin McCarthy is chaos,” Gaetz explained. “I think $33 trillion in debt is chaos. I think that facing a $2.2-trillion annual deficit is chaos.” Now, there are numerous people to blame for the impending fiscal disaster, but McCarthy is no more guilty than most.
One of the least convincing claims by Gaetz’s defenders is that McCarthy was punished for ignoring the base. “The base,” of course, is a popular euphemism for the most vociferous populist faction of the GOP. This faction enjoys blowing things up — mostly their own party’s prospects. In this case, the “base” was represented by eight Republicans and the entire Democratic Party.
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