Y’all may have been bitterly disappointed that the “ray of hope” I offered you on the House speaker mess has still not led to a speaker of any kind, much less the kind we need — the kind who still possesses all his (or her) marbles. Or at least, one who had some marbles at some point in the past.
Why is this failing to happen? Because the yahoos who completely unnecessarily created this crisis are still bat-excrement crazy.
But now, one of our own is riding to the rescue:
Fine. I’ll be the next speaker of the house.
— Bryan Caskey (@BryanCaskey) October 25, 2023
Sure you might read that and say, Aw, Bryan’s just being a wise guy again!
But consider: He posted that at 10:22 this morning, and hasn’t retracted it yet! Give him a few more minutes, and his combined availability and viability will have lasted longer than that of any previous candidate.
And yes, he’s viable. Y’all know he’s a legit, Old School kind of conservative, only one with a sense of humor. And he’s also legit in the sense that you don’t have to be a member of the House to be speaker.
Also, he’s got this rare-but-wonderful qualification: You can tell he doesn’t really want the job. That makes him ideal in my book. I don’t think we’ve seen an opportunity like that since James Garfield in 1880.
Garfield went to the 1880 Republican convention to nominate someone else. And when the ballots dragged on, and people started nominating him as an alternative, he fought it for all he was worth. That, of course, made him such an appealing candidate that the delegates ended up nominating him unanimously.
OK, so Bryan’s not that perfect, since he’s willing. But let’s forgive him that, and see if we can get some momentum going for him. (It might take a bit of effort. After several hours, he’s only received three “likes” on his offer. Ahem…)
Because, you know, we’re long past holding our breaths for “perfect.” Sanity would be a tremendous blessing at this point.
And I think Bryan can settle down and deliver on that, if we give him a chance.
I mean really — what are our alternatives right now?
Blog posts gotta have pictures, so here’s one of the 1880 Republican Convention. Photographic proof that it the old party actually WAS once grand. Or at least functional. Wikipedia says that’s Garfield standing on the podium, about to speak…
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Looks like I’m safe since it appears the position has been filled. Perhaps my volunteering to serve scared enough people in Congress to get their act together and elect someone else. 🙂
Yeah, I just saw that:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/10/25/house-speaker-vote/
But they’re not serious about this guy, are they? Maybe it will be open again soon…
Dang. I was away from my PC for a minute when I saw what the House had done, and tried to post that comment you see above, and thought I had …. then, when I got BACK to my PC, I saw that my comment had not yet been approved, because I suppose I wasn’t logged in as administrator on the iPad.
Great.
But did you see this in that story:
Wow. Hey, doofus, that reporter was giving you a chance to reassure the country that you’re not a lunatic, you’ve outgrown all that, and you no longer hate America. Or America’s allies. (Yeah, he’s voted against aid for Ukraine.)…
I read something else in that story (actually, it’s not a “story” but one of those maddening “Live Update” things that are so hard to link to in any helpful way):
“Republicans who ousted McCarthy celebrate Johnson’s speakership”
Oh, great. So eight people in America are happy about it.
What recourse does the rest of America have?
Of course, I realize many of you can’t read it anyway.
So here’s an NPR version. And here’s what The Guardian has reported. I think both of those remain free…
Note that the Guardian version is also a “live update” feature instead of a coherent narrative. Sorry…
The only chance he had was to win the support of Trump, then he would have had a chance.
That’s where his party is.