Messy Democracy
The Republicans all try to justify the four day debacle this week as just “messy democracy.” They cite that this is an example of open debate on the issues. They claim this is the way the founders wanted it to be. I’m not at all sure they have any idea what the founders wanted, but that’s beside the point. The real issue is that what we saw in the first four days of McCarthy’s attempt to be Speaker of the House is a farce. There are several reasons why I believe this. First, the debate was hardly open. All the agreements took place behind closed doors and in non-public arenas. The C-Span cameras didn’t catch real debate. No one except eavesdroppers heard a word of the discussions, concessions, and arguments of the GOP as they wrangled the objectors to McCarthy’s rule from twenty to six to zero. Yes, we did see a disturbing instance of one Representative having to be restrained because he wanted to attack one of the hold-outs. And later, as we usually do, we learned that his outr...