Matt Gaetz: Kevin McCarthy Is Not the Man to Lead the Congress at this Dangerous Moment.

Despite the bloviations of Mark Levin and Sean "Mehmet Oz is my hero" Hannity that We Constitutional Conservatives must once again Do Our Patriotic Duty and Bend Over and Take Down Our Pants for the Cause of Liberty and Sodomy, it's time for conservatives to say, "Go Fuck Yourselves."

The administration is aiding and abetting an invasion of the Southern border. Our rights are being stripped away. We are at war and the enemy is within.

In response to this existential threat, we're told that we need to entrust a congressman previously recognized as the "tech industry's best friend" as our leader.

That's boneheaded. Kevin McCarthy is not the right leader for the moment. Fortunately, enough Republicans recognize that to stop him from being the next Speaker of the House. Five House Republicans, including myself, have announced that we will not vote for McCarthy during the January 3rd speaker election. As many have privately also informed McCarthy of their plans to vote for someone else.

McCarthy's allies are fretting and are pushing out a false narrative that opposition to the Paul Ryan endorsed McCarthy will embolden Democrats to elect a squish Republican as Speaker. It turns out that spin is right, just not the way the McCarthy camp sold it.

Semafor is reporting that "Leader-designate Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y. waved off the suggestion Democrats would help elect an alternative for speaker, while Whip Jim Clyburn, D-S.C. all but volunteered Democrats' support to help get McCarthy over the threshold of votes needed for speaker."

This is the uniparty in action and should let you know that McCarthy is not a threat to the system destroying America. How could he be? His closest adviser has represented Pfizer, Amazon, and a firm dedicated to giving out a path to American citizenship to wealthy Chinese. His roommate counts Google among his clients.

This is the moment for a fight and McCarthy's instinct is flight. In the days after January 6, McCarthy asked in a call with Liz Cheney whether Twitter can take away Conservative Congressman Barry Moore's Twitter account because Rep. Moore pointed out that the shooting of Ashli Babbit doesn't fit the left's narrative of January 6.

McCarthy, likewise, said I was endangering the safety of Rep. Cheney by criticizing her.

The defense of McCarthy is that he isn't an ideologue. He just wants to get along, they say, and moves with the times.

Rep. Matt Rosendale, one of the five Republicans standing athwart McCarthy, put it well when he said, "We don't need a weatherman, we need a leader." A leader would stand up to the Biden administration's demands to send tens of billions of dollars to protect Ukraine's border instead of ours.

A leader wouldn't wait until thousands of military service members have been kicked out due to a mandate to end it. That's the problem with living with Frank Luntz and making all of your decisions based on polling data. You will always be late.

But enough about Rep. McCarthy, now is the time for conservatives to come to terms with the fact that the Speakership is up for grabs. Five Republicans are enough to stop Kevin McCarthy from becoming Speaker.

In order to avoid chaos on January 3rd, Republicans need to embrace reality.

More at the link. He plans to vote for Andy Biggs for Speaker.

As I've mentioned, the Freedom Caucus has said they could support McCarthy -- if he agreed to some reforms that would move the House away from the "Imperial Speakership" model, in which the Speaker gets to decide alone what matters can even be voted on, in favor of how the House used to operate, to wit, like an actual democratic body, in which individual members could propose legislation and amendments and it would be voted up or down.

I think they also want the power to demand a vote to remove the Speaker from his position -- if he acts like he no doubt will.

Now I don't know about you, but I have not heard any news about McCarthy agreeing to any reforms in how the House will do its business going forward.

Which means McCarthy is attempting to ride roughshod over the conservatives, once again, and demand their votes while addressing precisely zero of their concerns. He wants to keep all the power in the House in his corrupt, liberal Luntz-caressed hands.

He wants them to vote him into power as Speaker, and then he never wants to hear from them again. All deals going forward will be worked out in back rooms with his coterie of liberals and with his Good Democrat Friends and then brought to the floor for a vote as faits accoplis. (LOL, I pluralized that just to be a prick and annoy people.)

Kevin McCarthy is saying, in the words of Freddie Mercury, "I Want It All."*

Well you shouldn't have it, Luntz Roommate.

Julie Kelly
@julie_kelly2

Andy Biggs and Matt Gaetz are 2 of a tiny handful of GOP House members who've denounced DOJs abusive J6 prosecution and holding of political prisoners. McCarthy has been silent.

Sounds like a longshot run but a fight worth having.

* Actually, in the words of Brian May, who wrote the song, music and lyrics. But that would have been a little confusing.

posted by Ace at 01:04 PM

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