By Rick Wilson
Mike Johnson’s elevation to Speaker of the House was how all wars of attrition end: pure exhaustion. The media was weary of the spectacle, the Members were tired of it, and the optics, politics, and practicalities were weighing heavily even on the Chaos Caucus.
Today’s House Speaker election put one of the most undemocratic Members of Congress in charge of the lower chamber. The GOP selected a man with a vast contempt for democracy second in line for the Presidency. It put a man of such extraordinarily extreme views on major issues from Ukraine to abortion that the train wreck to come is not only expected but inevitable.
It places a man who tried to overturn the 2020 election in a position to certify the 2024 election.
One guess on what he does if it’s close.
There are a few reasons it ended today:
1- The House Republicans were exhausted. Even these tone-deaf, window-licking goons realized the generic polling was starting to slip and slip badly. The National Republican Congressional Committee has been frozen on fundraising and recruitment.
And honestly, they were a bit sick of people seeing them in their real form: petty, vindictive, squabbling children one wouldn’t trust to operate an IHOP. Their fragile self-images as the last valiant warriors against the woke libtard Soros antifa lizard alien transhumanist atheist celebrity abortionist mimes on the other side of the aisle depend on the public never witnessing them in a moment of crisis or reality.
Americans saw the House GOP for what it is: Trump’s shock troops reared on a diet of hate and cruelty. We can’t have that.
2 - They couldn’t keep the outrage hamster wheel spinning. Remember, the GOP’s purpose today isn’t to lead or represent home-state and -district constituents. It’s not to pass laws or to do anything as mundane as governance. No, the entire reason for being in the House for every Republican member is to keep the Outrage Orouboros fed and happy.
They need hearings on Hunter’s Laptop. (Gym Jordan always wants to examine the dick pics, you know, in his private chambers.) They need the faux rage about CRT, DEI, EIEIO, or whatever culture war twaddle Claremont is vomiting out this week.
They need Impeachment-palooza to drive a billion stories about “duh Biden Krime Familee.” They need airtime for lackwit Representative Jim Comer to faff on about how Biden, then a private citizen, was paid back for a $200,000 loan he made to a family member. (Shocking! Scandalous! Also, utter garbage.)
Their entire role is a circle of spectacle and feigned outrage, all for clicks online, email donations, and Fox hits.
3 - Johnson looks the part. He has good hair, good suits, and nice glasses. He doesn’t look like a mouth-breathing jadrool. Don’t underestimate the degree to which looking normal plays to the Washington media, the donor community, and even the Democrats in opposition. I promise you, Johnson will be booked on the Sunday shows just as if he were a normal Republican without a record of grotesque extremism.
4 - The 18 Republicans in Biden-won districts and the vaunted Problem Solvers just…gave up. They shredded their their already-thin “moderate” credentials today. They voted not just for a garden-variety election denier but for one of Trump’s most vocal and mendacious bootlicks.
They’re from districts Joe Biden won and will try to hold their seats by boldly stating they voted against Jim Jordan. They will, of course, decide that they voted for someone worse. The No Labels funded “Problem Solvers” proved the only problem they can’t solve is their moral rot.
Washington is a city of spectacle.
And it’s about to get much, much worse.
