Many bits and bytes have been spilled, much bandwidth has been filled, and a lot of schadenfreude glee expressed over the resignations from the House by Republicans in the midst of their raging dumpster fire of a cock-up in governing. Unfortunately, as fun as the schadenfreude of their resignations is, we’ve got the questions and interpretations wrong.
Could Republican resignations flip the House to Democrats?
The GOP majority is quite small, but a Democratic takeover pre-election still seems extremely unlikely.
The GOP’s majority in the House of Representatives was already very narrow — and it’s getting even narrower.
But could it get narrow enough that Democrats actually take control this year — before the election?
Could Republican resignations flip the House to Democrats? Andrew Prokop andrew@vox.com Mar 30, 2024 on Vox
The question isn’t whether or not the Republican self-destruction could become so extensive that control of the House could flip to the Dems for a week or two — wouldn’t that add just more chaos to an already chaotic House term: Hakeem Jeffries becoming Speaker for two weeks followed by a monthlong brawl by Republicans in electing a new speaker? — but why are the Republicans leaving?
I don’t mean why are they resigning as in the typical, I need to spend more time with my family, excuse, but why are they leaving if they are fed up with the Republican MAGA members leverage over the caucus?
So, comment on this: If they really were concerned about putting country over party or self-interest, they would stay in House and vote with the Democrats giving an effective counter-balance to the small MAGA wing lead by Creepy Prom Date Gaetz and Maddog Greene and provide some opportunity for some bipartisan bills to be passed.
If Kevin McCarthy really wanted to screw the Republican “majority” that ousted him from the speakership, he would be voting with the Democrats on legislation, and the same with Ken Buck and Mike Gallagher.
Of course, that would take real courage in the face of the MAGA hate and violence spewing flying monkey squad descending upon them. But, it would strengthen the middle of American politics and provide them with a platform to possibly end MAGA’s strangle-hold not only on the Republican party but on the entire country.
By resigning, they are still putting their hatred of Democrats before all else. The act of resigning seems like it screws the MAGA wing, it just adds to the chaos they can cause by making irrational impossible legislative demands for their votes.
If they would vote with the Democrats, then actual bipartisan legislation could be passed.
The path forward or the American democratic experiment is not to run away in the face of MAGA attempts to destroy our democracy and usher in fascist oligarchy, but to stand up and be counted — as in voting, whether it is in the legislatures or at the voting booth — with or for Democrats, which would render MAGA a dying ideology in the legislatures and at the ballot, and they would finally go the way of the Whigs.
Image Attribution
This image was generated using Poe’s StableDiffusionXL bot using the prompt, A sinking Titanic with the iceberg. Rats fleeing the ship.
The Psy of Life 
The corruption of the Republican Party is, too, deep, and, everything is just, starting to, disdolve for the party, just like in my country, and yet, are the, followers of these, individual, political, cults, awkake? Or, must the people, come to, until they’re all, falling off, that cliff! The blind loyalty, to a corrupt political party, is just, too, deep to, root up, in all the world’s “free”, countries. And, we still voted these, dictatorship political parties, these, “presidents-in-disguise”, into leadership roles. At the end, we still, have, no one else to blame, if our countries, go to, hell.
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Unfortunately, Taurus, the followers of the Republican Party whole-heartedly want fascism. They want to putting people into concentration camps and committing state-sponsored mass murder. In the US, these are the same people who went to public lynchings of Black Americans and applauded. These are the same people who fought for the South in the American Civil War to maintain slavery. And, they will always have someone else to blame. That is the magic of fascism.
Huzzah!
Jack
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Howdy Taurus!
I’m glad to see that you survived the earthquake fairly unscathed. I hope that the government doesn’t screw up its response as it did the warnings. Not likely, I know, but, for humanity one has to hope.
Taiwan’s democracy is much younger than ours and came out of that strongman leader tradition. Peter Turchin’s research suggests that when a new form of government supplants a “traditional” form, meaning one that has been in place over a long period of time, it often then reverts to the traditional form. He cites the Arab Spring in Egypt that elected a Muslim Brotherhood government and then was fairly quickly overthrown by el-Sisi. I’m not suggesting that this is what is happening in Taiwan but y’all haven’t quite made a full generation under democracy yet, so maybe?
There are always people who will want a strong central leader type of government. They always believe that what ever harm or hardship it may cause them will be worth it because it will cause more harm and hardship to the scapegoated group. It is a sick and totally alien form of thought to me, but in the US, that is the pattern of our racism. As long as it hurts Blacks first and worst, white people will put up with it.
MAGA wants a Trump dictatorship. They want his vengeance to be inflicted onto all they perceive as having harmed them. What they don’t know is that Trump will avenge his own hurts and sell what he can to the highest bidder, like he just sold himself to Tik-Tok owner Jeffry Yass.
Once he’s in office, he won’t give a rats ass about MAGA. He won’t need them. He won’t be standing for another election. He might need them to further intimidate the judiciary and Congress into compliance, but after that is done. If he ever gets secure in his position, he won’t care about them any more than he does his own children.
Luckily, the people who want democracy outnumber the people who don’t in the US. Hopefully, we’ll all be voting like it in November.
And, I hope that y’all in Taiwan will be voting like it, too.
Huzzah!
Jack
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We have to consider the possibility that the resigners are not going in fear of future stochastic terrorism from the MAGA cult, but in response to threats and harassment already suffered. I’m reminded of the Senate Republicans, former and sitting, who have said they voted to acquit in one or both of Trump’s impeachment trials because they and their families had been threatened if they didn’t.
As for the Democrats getting a temporary majority, the time period of that needs to be two years, and the time to accomplish that is November 5th, at the ballot box.
The other, but much slower remedy is the prosecution and conviction of all of Trump’s co-conspirators, including those now sitting in the House and Senate.
Of course, a legal criminal definition of domestic stochastic terrorism may also be needed.
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Howdy Bob!
That such threats are effective demonstrates the fragility of democracy and the courage necessary to maintain it. It makes the court personnel who are involved in Trump’s trials all the more awesome. It also makes the social engineering that has gotten us to this point of incivility all the more awful.
The courts are slow and we’ve seen too many signs of corruption in the judiciary when it comes to the contradictory nature of justice meted out at various levels of the courts. Of course, that lack of agreement between lower and upper courts is another way that the fascists have damaged our democracy.
The real change is needed at the individual level in which we soundly reject these methods. We need to reject through the ballot, but also through our actions. Don’t buy guns, don’t open carry, don’t get licenses, reject ridiculous rhetoric when offered at public meetings. It is easier said than done, but we need to take our culture back.
Huzzah!
Jack
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“When good people do nothing …”
Yes, a change of consciousness is need.
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