Republicans Started a Civil War They Don’t Know How to End
House Republicans haven’t been terribly successful at many things this year. They struggled to keep the government open and to keep the United States from defaulting on its debt. They’ve even struggled at times on basic votes to keep the chamber functioning. But they have been very good at one thing: regicide.
On Friday, Republicans dethroned Jim Jordan as their designated Speaker, making him the third party leader to be ousted this month. First, there was Kevin McCarthy, who required 15 different ballots to even be elected Speaker and was removed from office by a right-wing rebellion at the beginning of October. Then, after a majority of Republicans voted to make McCarthy’s No. 2, Steve Scalise, his successor, a number of Republicans announced that they, too, would torpedo his candidacy and back Jordan instead. Finally, once Republicans finally turned to Jordan as their candidate, the largest rebellion yet blocked him from becoming Speaker. After losing three successive votes on the floor, the firebrand lost an internal vote to keep his position as Speaker designate on Friday.
I mean, the only way for it to ever end was total fascist victory or total Republican destruction. There was no other endgame, and they had to know that. Which makes what they were hoping for obvious. Thankfully they were never going to win it fair and square, and their cheats aren't working for now. Hopefully this is the last gasp for the GOP.
So... If the GOP crumbles, do we get a new Left of Left I can vote for? You know, someone that actually wants to fund the elderly and healthcare and basic human rights, stop the war on drugs?
My "if I could wave a political magic wand" solution would be:
The Republicans all but disappear. Maybe they would get 1% of the vote every election cycle, but nobody would take their candidate seriously. They'd get, at most, one piece per election cycle saying "looks like the Republicans are running a Nazi Klansman who wears his hood and waves around a Nazi flag at every event. And on actually important political news..."
The Democratic party would split. One faction would be the Centrists. They would effectively be a "conservative" party in that they would be to the right. However, they would support LGBTQ+ rights, women's rights, etc. They might not support universal healthcare via Medicare For All, but they'd want as many people to have affordable health care and health insurance.
The Progressives would split off from the Centrists. They would push for things like Medicare for All and other major policy changes.
First Past The Post would get replaced with Ranked Choice or Approval Voting so that third parties could thrive. I prefer Ranked Choice, but Approval Voting is likely easier for the masses. In fact, they pretty much use it all the time on social media. "If you want to vote for Jack Johnson, click the 'like' button next to his name. If you want to vote for John Jackson, click the 'like' button next to HIS name."
1, 2, and 3 are all but inevitable; it's just a matter of when.
4 will be trickier, but we're seeing experiments going on with it all over the place. I'm hopeful it'll happen more broadly sometime in my lifetime.
I mean... democrats in aggregate are conservative as all fuck. Biden stated "things will not fundamentally change" which is as conservative a sentiment as anyone could say. Anytime anything that doesn't directly benefit the rich is proposed, democrats are lukewarm at best.
Seeing the Republicans self destruct in culture war garbage and just straight up bafflingly spiteful "policy" is amusing, but there's another effect of the Republicans' dick measuring contest to see who is more reactionary: They've gone off the rails moving right and democrats have been more than happy to shift into the moderate to center right voids that have been freed up. There is no viable left in this country. Bernie and AOC are not only outliers, but AOC in particular has blunted the more prickly parts of her platform and conceded quite a bit when it comes to votes and stances on policy.
That's called "leadership". Politics is the art of the possible. It's not a feel good love fest where everyone hugs and agrees with you.
AOC and others have been very good at moving Biden to the left. This presidency has been one of the most productive for the left wing of the Democratic Party. They passed a single bill that cut prescription drug prices, funded climate change legislation, and funded the IRS to crack down on rich tax cheats.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inflation_Reduction_Act
What more could they add? Everyone gets a puppy and can kick Clarence Thomas in the groin one time?
Packing the court and ejecting the coup participants would be nice. Not to mention patching the holes the GOP poked in the ACA. Closing more tax loopholes for the 1%.
Beyond that? Medicare for all, UBI, an actual privacy law that does anything at all, some sort of legislation on police brutality and racial profiling, something to fix gerrymandering, a proposal to eliminate the Electoral College and First-Past-The-Post, a bill to end Citizens United...the FCC is actually moving forward on Net Neutrality now, so that's cool. But there's plenty more they could do.
Well hang on a second. I think we should hear the cons of this proposal.
I said "What more could they add?"
None of that would pass.
Ah, I took your ad absurdum suggestions at the end the wrong way. I assumed you meant that they were so ridiculous because all of the reasonable things had been exhausted, not that they were the most bipartisan options that would be rejected.
I'd also like parental leave and 20 ish days min vacation, Alex.
Your country is so fucked
They would have my vote.
You start off the negotiations with far left position of two kicks to his groin. One kick is the compromise position.
I'm aware that you can't caucus and get anything done as a frothing at the mouth socialist in today's climate, but the compromise approach is a slippery slope
Unfortunately for her she is the left's poster child, so gets it from both sides. I'm still largely a fan and agree with her a lot more than I don't, but some of her recent decisions rubbed me the wrong way
Compromise is literally the way liberal democracy is designed to work. This is supported by a massive volume of literature going back as far as Locke and Hume and Rousseau. I have no idea how you could even type such a statement in good faith.
It just reeks of nihilism. How can you seriously read the previous 200 years of European history and come to the conclusion that nothing has changed? That people's lives aren't better? That they aren't happier, or living longer or more free?
I mean Christ, I want to abolish capitalism just as much as the next guy, but I'm not going to sit here and pretend that the current system is irredeemably evil when it's made a comparative fuck ton of progress towards post-scarcity socialism compared to any other period of human history.
The current system is irredeemably evil though, isn't it? It is destroying us in an ever tightening death march of greed instead of saving the planet. It is starving and imprisoning, as a means to provide slave labor, instead of using surplus labor to actually feed, clothe, and shelter us all.
Right, humans are historically shitty. The point is that we have mitigated a significant amount of historic evil in the past 200 years, and have a framework for continued progress.
Utopia is a journey, not a destination. But we have objectively never witnessed a greater rate of progress in recorded human history.
But progress is not due to capitalism. (that would be a post hoc fallacy) And global warming is an issue that is coming to a head this decade and the next few to come. This isn't some distant future utopian problem. This is pragmatic, and essential to continued human survival on this planet.
It's almost like the weight of actual responsibility has a tendency to moderate political views. It's easy as fuck to be an armchair politician. It's much more difficult to actually govern when you have to attach your name to policy.
The sad thing is the number of people who will read this and still cling to their naive politics, and take the intellectually dishonest path because they are unburdened by any kind of pragmatism.
Saying “things will not fundamentally change” was such a masterstroke, if his goal was to keep the right at their usual simmering level of hate while also upsetting most of the people who had to hold their nose to vote for him.
I can't see how it did any favors for him, except in the eyes of the corpora- oh...
He's known for making stupid unproductive off the cuff comments. It's one of his trademarks. What really matters is that when it comes down to the work of crafting policy, he's actually a very skilled politician. Whether one agrees with said policy is another matter, but no one can argue that he doesn't get things done.
Since fascism has no endgame--only eternal struggle--it was more a question of the fascists destroying their own country or not before they get cleared out.
It wouldn't take much of a push for the GOP to crumble right now.
Here's hoping. Let's get shoving.
How can I help??
Protest every stupid thing they do. Get local and state Republicans out of office, too. Support good journalism.
Nothing new, unfortunately; but we're hopefully in the final stretch.
Your post brought me some hope so thanks. I won't quit but thanks. 💕