Conservative Historian

Clown House

January 08, 2023 Bel Aves
Conservative Historian
Clown House
Show Notes Transcript

This is a scary podcast. Ghouls, Ghosts and Goblins? No, far more frightening. Santos, McCarthy, Gaetz and Boebert.  We talk about the history of the House of Representatives. Take a listen, if you dare! (cue evil laugh)

Clown House 

January 2023

 

“It is that in a democracy, the people meet and exercise the government in person: in a republic, they assemble and administer it by their representatives and agents. A democracy, consequently, must be confined to a small spot. On the other hand, a republic may be extended over a large region.”

 

James Madison in the Federalist Papers

 

“I weep for the liberty of my country when I see at this early day of its successful experiment that corruption has been imputed to many members of the House of Representatives, and the rights of the people have been bartered for promises of office.”

 

Andrew Jackson on the corrupt bargain of 1824

 

 “I have accepted a seat in the House of Representatives and thereby have consented to my own ruin, to your ruin, and to the ruin of our children. I give you this warning that you may prepare your mind for your fate.” 

 

John Adams, in a letter to his wife, Abigail

 

Don’t you love a farce?

 My fault, I fear

 I thought that you’d want what I want

 Sorry my dear

 But where are the clowns?

 Send in the clowns

 Don’t bother

 They’re here

 

Stephen Sondheim from A Little Night Music

 

And here we have quotes from the 1989 almost-nominated academy award-winning movie Clown House

Trouble at that mad house, Where the crazy people live, Why would any of them want to break out? [Comically]  Maybe to go to the circus!

 

They really are out tonight

 [Confused]  Who are?

 

The clowns

 

During the incomparable movie Lincoln, the titular character has a conversation with his Secretary of State, and right-hand man William Seward calls the House a “rat’s nest filled with talentless hicks and hacks.” Thank God we are now doing so much better.  

 

Keep in mind that I am a firm believer in the comment that democracy is a terrible form of government, excepting for all others. I am not keen to be ruled by somebody because they happened to be born to the right person. The thought that some general and his bloodthirsty troops have sway over me is not really palatable. And Communism? I like to live in a prosperous nation where I am not welded into my home because I caught a disease, and of course, I like being alive, a choice not open to the 40 million Chinese destroyed by Mao.  

 

So, with that qualification, let’s say that the 1865 and 2023 versions of the House of Representatives were probably more in the realm of normalcy. A few podcasts ago, comparing Andrew Jackson and Donald Trump, I described at the time, in 1824, when the House of Representatives chose the president. In Jackson’s estimation, the corrupt aspect was the eventual winner of the presidency, John Quincy Adams, who then named Henry Clay of Kentucky to the coveted post of Secretary of State. It just so happened that representative Clay was instrumental in getting Adams the votes needed to prevail in the House. But, as was typical, Jackson got the last laugh winning the presidency outright and putting the historical odium of “one-timer” on Adams.  

 

For those thinking the vitriol used in today’s debates is outlandish, well they lack historical knowledge or the passions of the pre-Bellum Congress. here is this from the official archives of the House of Representatives. “The most infamous floor brawl in the history of the U.S. House of Representatives erupted as Members debated the Kansas Territory’s pro-slavery Lecompton Constitution late into the night of February 5-6. Shortly before 2 a.m., Pennsylvania Republican Galusha Grow and South Carolina Democrat, Laurence Keitt exchanged insults, then blows. “In an instant, the House was in the greatest possible confusion,” the Congressional Globe reported. More than 30 Members joined the melee. Northern Republicans and Free Soilers joined ranks against Southern Democrats. Speaker James Orr, a South Carolina Democrat, gaveled furiously for order and then instructed Sergeant-at-Arms Adam J. Glossbrenner to arrest non-compliant Members. Wading into the “combatants,” Glossbrenner held the House Mace high to restore order. Wisconsin Republicans John “Bowie Knife” Potter and Cadwallader Washburn ripped the hairpiece from the head of William Barksdale, a Democrat from Mississippi. The melee dissolved into a chorus of laughs and jeers, but the sectional nature of the fight powerfully symbolized the nation’s divisions. When the House reconvened two days later, a coalition of Northern Republicans and Free Soilers narrowly blocked the referral of the Lecompton Constitution to the House Territories Committee. Kansas entered the Union in 1861 as a free state.”

 

None of the shenanigans we will soon cover on today’s house would have happened under Il Representative Joe “Uncle Joe” Cannon. “Uncle Joe” Cannon’s career in Congress spanned almost five decades. During that time, Cannon served as chairman of three committees: Expenditures in the Post Office Department, Rules, and Appropriations. From the 58th Congress through the 61st Congress (1903–1911), he simultaneously chaired the Rules Committee and served as Speaker of the House. As chair of the Rules Committee, Cannon managed the floor schedule for legislation, and, as Speaker, he controlled the debate on the floor. During Cannon’s reign, he usurped power from the committee chairs and ruled the Congress with an iron fist, earning him the nickname “Czar Cannon.” He once said, “Sometimes in politics, one must duel with skunks, but no one should be fool enough to allow skunks to choose the weapons.” I am not confident I would approve of Uncle Joe, his methods, and his accumulation of power. But he stands in just a teensy bit of contrast with today’s GOP caucus in the House. 

 

In a podcast completed last October, I highlighted gaslighting throughout history. I cited numerous lies from Biden, including everything from his biography to “the border is secure” and “inflation is coming down.” None of this was true, of course, nor was his predecessor’s “if you like your doctor, you will keep your doctor.” And I see the desire to point to these lies as an excuse to ignore George Santos. In an article for Reason Magazine by Scott Shackford, the author states of Santos, “Earlier this month, after investigating Santos’ background, The New York Times reported that it could not verify much of the information he had told voters. Santos publicly admitted some of his lies in an interview over Christmas weekend with the New York Post. He has not worked for Goldman Sachs or Citigroup, as he has claimed. (He was apparently working as a call center employee for Dish Network during that time). He also never graduated from Baruch College in New York City, as he had claimed. It’s not clear at this point how much of Santos’ background is actually true. Is he even gay? He was once married to a woman, The Daily Beast reports but divorced her in 2019, just before his first (failed) run for Congress in 2020. This, of course, doesn’t mean he’s not gay. (He recently married his male partner). But it is a bit unusual.”

 

The misleading claims even turned comical when he admitted to the New York Post that he’s Catholic and not Jewish, as he had claimed. “I never claimed to be Jewish,” he explained. “I am Catholic. Because I learned my maternal family had a Jewish background, I said I was ‘Jew-ish.’” It sounds like something a character from Seinfeld or It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia might say when they’re caught in a lie.”

 

And, of course, there is the vote from Kevin McCarthy. Though it only took a week, and it represented the first time in 100 years that such a speaker’s election took this long, McCarthy won the election as House speaker on the 15th ballot after days of grueling negotiations that forced leaders to make concessions to the party’s far-right members up to the last moment of sometimes-heated discussions on the House floor. 

 

The victory marked a personal achievement for McCarthy, who had yet to secure the speakership more than seven years ago. It clawed his way to a win early Saturday morning after four days of repeated rejections. McCarthy got 216 votes to 212 for Democrat Hakeem Jeffries from New York (I find it interesting that lately, California and New York account for congressional leadership). Six Republicans voted present, changing the dynamics for Mr. McCarthy to win the vote. As a result, the new Speaker will control the GOP’s only power center in a divided capital. He agreed to several demands to bring on board his opponents, including giving them more power to shape spending bills and roles on committees.

 

During this process, I loved this quote from McCarthy stalwart Tom Cole of OK: “I don’t know how many times you have to tell people we’re not moving. This is the guy that got us here, and we don’t intend to leave Moses on the other side of the river. He’s coming with us.” The analogy works pretty well, except that Moses did not have a backbone of jelly and did not appease Jewish leaders who incited riots. If McCarthy had been the leader of the Jews in 1300 BCE, he would have tried to cut a deal with Pharoah as long as the Egyptian King kept him in his position, God and magic staffs be damned.  

 

But for all of the smiles on McCarthy’s face after finally winning, his might prove a pyrrhic victory. Hanging in the balance is the ability of the U.S. government to stay open and pay its debts. Many of Mr. McCarthy’s initial foes are adamantly opposed to raising the debt ceiling or cutting spending deals with Democrats and could move to oust him from his job if he tries to do so. Also at risk are other high-profile measures that would require agreement between House Republicans and the Democrats who control the Senate and White House: funding the Pentagon and other agencies, sending aid to Ukraine as it battles an invasion, and approving food stamps for low-income people as part of the farm bill, which is typically reauthorized every five years. 

 

Now I am a minority who does not mind the debt battles. And I despise the “shutting down the government trope.” Oh no, we cannot go to Utah’s Zion National Park! What never shuts down in these so-called governmental shutdowns? Social Security and Medicare, the two most significant deficit and debt drivers, still pay their bills. So does the military. After that, I am hard-pressed for some of these necessities.  

 

Is McCarthy my first choice? Probably not. But over 216 GOP representatives think he is the guy though some voted present, which still worked. And yet the contortionist McCarthy nor the memory-challenged Mr. Santos (assuming that is his real name) are not even the most odious of the Republican party in the house. Nope. That title goes to Matt Gaetz, Lauren Boebert, and the rest of the Never Kevin branch. Now there were actually two factions who initially opposed McCarthy. The first, led by Chip Roy of Texas, had legitimate demands. In light of the $1.7 trillion pork fest omnibus package (more on that later), these representatives wanted to stop the odious practice of leadership crafting a massive bill and then giving representatives hours to yeah or nay it.  

 

But that was just part of the never Kevins; the other part, the Gaetz Boebert segment, seemed to have a precisely zero agenda different than getting on TV or more clicks. And in this Mission Accomplished. During the week, we were treated to Boebert on Sean Hannity’s show and Gaetz on Laura Ingraham’s. Because Fox is the 800-pound gorilla of conservative media, these GOP darlings must have been over the moon. After McCarthy’s win, they are undoubtedly crafting additional things to be opposed to without offering concrete or legitimate alternatives. The opposition is the thing.  

 

In the Musical Hamilton, the King (George III) has three songs in which he essentially, and in the vein of dark comedy, talks of the American colonies the way an abuser talks of his victim. 

But though the King’s song is meant to be comic relief from the main story, it has several pieces of incisiveness. After Britain formerly gives up the American colonies, the King intones

 

What comes next?

 You’ve been freed

 Do you know how hard it is to lead?

 You’re on your own

 Awesome, wow!

 Do you have a clue what happens now?

Oceans rise

Empires fall

It’s much harder when it’s all your call

 

Well, not all your call, of course, given Trumpist interventions that cost the GOP the Senate, and there is always Biden, but it is one thing to be in opposition, free to critique everything those in power do and to hold the reins yourself. After all, leading, writing, legislating, working on committees, and crafting bills. That is all work. It also is a short job description of a member of the House of Representatives. Know what is not or should not be in that description. “Must have been on Fox Prime Time shows at least 60,000 times.”  

 

We had this nugget with a vague resemblance to the brawl of 1858. A tense moment on the House of Representatives floor resulted in a Republican member physically lunging at another, who then had to be restrained from further escalation by Representative Richard Hudson. The scuffle happened between Reps-elect Mike Rogers from Alabama, and Gaetz, after the 14th House speaker vote failed. Gaetz was discussing with Kevin McCarthy the possibility of backing him in the next vote and appeared to mouth the word “committee.”

 

The rational, core historian part of me abhors Rogers’s behavior. The best approach to Gaetz would be to find a popular Floridan conservative, like a state senator from the panhandle, and run them against Gaetz. But my instinct tells me that a punch in the mouth might be the type of medicine that Gaetz needs because clearly, someone failed to teach him morals, loyalty, or anything resembling an effective member of Congress. A minimal beating might compel him to do what he really wants to do, spout invective on talk radio or get a gig on Newsmax and run a blog/podcast where he says mean things about people, mainly against those not in a position to fight back. Maybe the real bad guy here was Hudson for preventing Rogers from providing a valuable service to the Republic.

 

What is going on in the Republican caucus is something I would typically term a Clown House, but that would be an insult to the $200,000 budgeted movie of that name—and seeing the trailer of this saga of killer clowns (the movie is sort of like poor man’s It) I struggle to see where the $200,000 went? Those proto-kick-starter investors should demand their money back. (check out the trailer in a link I have conveniently put in the transcript here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3GCxN9UJkTQ&t=49s). But in case you are searching savvy, just put Clownhouse into YouTube search. Do not look for it on TikTok; too long, and why should you tell the Chinese Communist Party that Clown House is trending? 

Will the movie Clown House be confused with Gone With the Wind, Godfather, or Citizen Kane? Probably not with a tagline such as “the nightmare is over, but the fun has just begun,” which for a horror movie does not even make any sense. But it feels comparable to the Clown House currently being run in Washington. With a minor language shift. “The GOP Clown House, the fun is over, and the nightmare has just begun.” (Hysterical Laughter). 

 

Part of the McCarthy spectacle featured Marjorie Taylor Greene looking better and more statesmanlike than Lauren Boebert and Matt Gaetz. All along, I thought that Gaetz and Boebert were performative jackasses but making Taylor Greene even smidgingly reputable is an accomplishment all in itself. But, of course, the level of the bar for that would be too daunting for the most intrepid limbo contestants. However, McCarthy teaming up with Taylor Greene is akin to the Predator vs. Aliens movie, where the humans have to team up with the Predator, noting that the Predator will turn on you at some point. Of the Boebert Taylor Green kerfuffle, Jay Nordlinger wrote, “Part of the Republican drama — or comedy — is a bitter rivalry between Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene and Congresswoman Lauren Boebert. Both are queen bees of MAGA. I think of an old expression: “This town ain’t big enough for the both of us.” Who will be La Pasionaria of MAGA? I think we have dueling pasionarias.”

 

But for all of the comedy, there are tears, of course. As with many things, liberals and progressives will always have the advantage over true conservatives. It is a simple matter of one side saying I am going to give you something and the other saying that it is a bad idea for these reasons. 

 

If you have to explain, you are losing, as the saying goes. Same with the principles of the Chip Roy faction of the house. The Democrats can easily unite because the only genuine debate is how much of a sludge pile behemoth spending bill they can get through. Even with a doddering president, a seven-vote majority in the House, and a single-vote majority in the Senate, they still managed to get an infrastructure bill with green pork. A $2.4 trillion build-back better bill with more green pork and money for a larger IRS. A silicon chip subsidy bill. And from Pelosi, a $1.7 Trillion omnibus bill that ran to 2,700 pages long, with over 7,500 earmarks and in a horribly effective corruption of government, gave the House precisely 12 hours to peruse this. 

I am a voracious reader, but I could not get through a 400-page, eminently readable David McCullough history in 12 hours. And the omnibus was chock-a-block with technical and legislative jargon. Twelve weeks would have made sense. Simply, it was not to be read, just voted on. And all the Democrats did. They want the pork, and they got it in spades, the future be damned, of course. This is why Chip Roy was onto something; too bad a principled representative is surrounded by the clown caucus. Boo!