The world is aflame, with terror attacks against Israel in the Middle East. Antisemitism is on the rise across the US and our troops are being attacked overseas by Iranian proxies. The Biden Administration is still planning on giving the Iranian Government billions of dollars, which will allow them to continue to fund terror. The US economy teeters day to day on the news and people a fleeing to gold to protect their money. The US government is weeks away from shutting down when the Continuing Resolution expires.
And the US House of Representatives was paralyzed because a small group of conservative Republican members, in a snit, voted out the Speaker of the House.
Speaker McCarthy did something some members didn't like - he kept the Government running to give the House time to vote on a budget. For that a small group of Conservatives decided Speaker McCarthy must go. Okay, what was the plan after that? They didn't have one.
Congressman Matt Gaetz went on TV and insisted the US would be better off without Speaker McCarthy - the House would pick a new Speaker and conservatives would rule. How is that working out?
The Republican Party, rightly so, is being alternately criticized and laughed at because the actions of a small group of Conservative members who put their egos and their principles - some will argue it was all ego and no principles - ahead of their Nation and ahead of their Party. The humiliation and chaos continue as the House remains shut down because other conservatives decided to play games when voting on a new Speaker in a form of payback to the ones who voted McCarthy out.
What these conservatives have done is demonstrate that conservatives don't know how to govern. It embarrasses me to say this but AOC and The Squad better understand how to effectively get things done than do the conservative Republicans in Congress.
In 2018, the Democrats retook the House and Nancy Pelosi had to go hat in hand to many members of her caucus to ask for their vote to return her as Speaker of the House. AOC and the Squad could have done what the rump faction of Republicans did but they chose not to. Instead, they cut a deal. Since that time, the Democrat party has been moving further and further down the looney limb that AOC and her Squad mates sit on - now the Squad didn't get everything they wanted but they definitely had a hand on the wheel in determining which direction the Democrats were going.
General George Patton used to say to his soldiers, you don't win a war by dying for your country, you win it by making the other guy die for HIS country. Conservatives in Congress have never figured that out and, as a result, Congress in chaos, the Republican party is humiliated, and the Democrats have a talking point that will likely allow them to retake the House in the next election.
And one final thing, to anyone who has ever used the phrase "RINO" (Republican in Name Only) to describe a Republican politician who doesn't vote the way you like, remember this. It wasn't the RINOs who put us in this situation.
Postscript - Mike Johnson is now the Speaker and the Conservatives who dumped Kevin McCarthy are taking credit and claiming the US is better off. Horse manure. The Caucus may have come together to elect Speaker Johnson, but during those three weeks without a Speaker we saw significant divisions become apparent in the Caucus. Divisions that a personal as well as political, and the disagreements have become public. The Republican Caucus is in worse shape for governing not better.
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