Welcome to Day Two of Operation Chaos, otherwise known as the ongoing humiliation of Rep Kevin McCarthy who is trying desperately to become Speaker of the House of the Representatives in spite of concerted opposition to his nomination by 20 hardline Republican members-elect.

Do keep in mind that until a Speaker is elected, the House is effectively barred from conducting any other meaningful business such as actually swearing in newly elected members and organising the committees that do the lion’s share of the legislating.

One of the key perks of being Speaker is that they’ve got the power to name who serves on what committee and more importantly who the chairman of the committee may be which usually gives the Speaker quite a bit of leverage and influence on how those committees proceed.

If you are the one laying the tracks, that’s usually the way the train goes!

Rep Matt Gaetz has made no attempt to hide the true intent of the 20 holdouts to force McCarthy to agree to a lengthy list of “reforms” that would effectively place the Speaker in a straitjacket with the added bonus of the Sword of Damocles hanging over their head in the form of a motion to “vacate the chair” that can be moved by just one member of the House. With the number of representatives voting against McCarthy’s nomination doing so because they either don’t trust or outright hate him, it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that should that motion be made, it’d definitely be successful.

To be fair, there are quite a few procedural reforms this gang of 20 are demanding that actually do make sense and would restore some measure of regular order and debate which has been sorely lacking these past few years where bills are sent to the floor with a closed rule that prevents meaningful debate and amendment. One they *SERIOUSLY* need to enact is a requirement that a bill being sent to the floor has to allow the members at least 72 hours (if not more!) to read the thing, especially when you’re talking about omnibus spending bills spending billions if not trillions of dollars and are thousands of pages long.

But some of the things these holdouts are demanding are meant to break the power of the Speaker and if we’re honest, humiliate McCarthy personally because should he be elevated to the chair and the gavel…the razor thin majority and the constant threat of being unseated by the loonies should they get their knickers in a twist is really making the job nothing like the one he’s dreamed of for all of these years.

I’ve seen no reason to change my opinion that I gave yesterday that McCarthy should seriously consider standing down and letting whatever fool would accept being Speaker under those severe restrictions take the fall for the chaos and inevitable breakdown of governance amongst the majority so that he can make the pitch for a bigger majority in 2024 and work to purge the House of as many MAGA extremists and election deniers as he possibly can.

The three votes that were taken went pretty much the way everyone expected with little shifting amongst the numbers.

Even though the proceedings did a wonderful job of finally breaking Mistletoe who graced me with the most delightful “I’m broken” look I’ve seen from her as she’s resting her head on the back of my chair in between one of the votes, there were occasional moments of levity courtesy of two of the more insane members of the Republican majority.

The first was Representative Marjorie Taylor Green of Georgia rocking an outfit that immediately brought to mind the costume of the main character from “The Handmaid’s Tale” without the signature bonnet.

You be the judge:

Someone might want to let Representative OFKEVIN of Georgia know that “The Handmaid’s Tale” was not supposed to be an operations manual for the United States and that she might want to avoid any visible cues that she’d be totally at home establishing the dystopian militaristic theocratic dictatorship of Gilead!

Interestingly enough, she took advantage of the three hour adjournment to go for a wardrobe change to something less Margaret Atwood inspired. Probably a good choice in the long run… 😉

However, whilst MTG may well have had the more flamboyant if dystopian choices of outfit, Representative Lauren Boebert of Colorado (or Ammo-Barbie(tm) for her propensity to put her ammo-sexual fetish on full display wandering round her rural district with an AR-15 or some other firearm at hand and occasionally blasting defenceless objects with them) certainly had the Possibly Unintentional Quote of the Day with this little nugget:

BYRON DONALDS is that leader. Republicans, including many moderates, have been impressed by BYRON DONALDS. They are impressed by his ability to work together. They respect his leadership. We see him as someone who can communicate what we are all wanting to do in this House to Americans.

Rep Lauren Boebert (3rd-CO) nominating Rep Byron Donalds of Florida for Speaker prior to the fifth vote

At first, I couldn’t believe I heard that Freudian slip of hers shown in BOLD type.

But after Zaprudering the C-SPAN footage of that particular bit of her speech a couple of times, she actually said it that way.

This is the reason why C-SPAN’s coverage of Congress is absolutely invaluable as you will hear things live that politicians love to deny that they said later. With the other networks often having their commentators offering the spin as the proceedings are happening, C-SPAN just shows you the live audio and video feed unfiltered and unedited. The House does retain control over the standard set of cameras and can (and often does) mute the audio, particularly during recorded votes and occasional discussions at the dais.

C-SPAN has a few extra cameras in the House chamber for the opening proceedings and has been catching quite a bit of the interplay and discussions amongst the members you don’t ordinarily see on the standard views. Sadly, those extra cameras will be gone once a new Speaker is elected but enjoy the extra vantage points as long as we have them.

It’s not enough to hear such unintended slips of the tongue on the C-SPAN footage.

Long time C-SPAN junkies will know of a particular phrase used often in the House where a member will ask “unanimous consent to revise and extend my remarks” if the rule accompanying a bill doesn’t already have the standard verbiage allowing members five days to do so.

What this means is that whatever they said for the cameras may bear no relation to what their remarks are reported to be in the pages of the Congressional Record which is the *ONLY* official source of record for Congressional actions taken on the floor or anywhere else.

The politicians know that the average American can’t be bothered to pay attention to even the edited and abridged version of events in Congress much less read the Congressional Record to hold their representatives accountable to the things they say.

I used to catch former Representative Bill McCollum of FL out with this blatant lying all the time. As the representative for a district that included UCF, he would often tout how much he valued education for the C-SPAN cameras but his votes and the completely reworded statement he’d “revise and extend” into the Congressional Record said otherwise. Then he’d come swanning down to Orlando touting how he was the “education representative we could count on for funding” and then be hustled out of his press briefing by his aides when I’d ask him to comment as to why the official record and his statement for the cameras didn’t jive with his actions which included several votes to cut funding for education at all levels.

So out of long habit, I had to check the Congressional Record and lo and behold Boebert’s oratory boo boo is still there for all of eternity!

I’m quite sure she meant “We see him as someone who can communicate what we are all wanting to do in this House *FOR* Americans.”

But that’s not what the Congressional Record says and what the CR says rules!

Whooops! As Steve Dangle would say…that’s a dang-it! 😉