Jan.11

electoral-vote.com

Dem 51

   

GOP 49

Do You Want to Know a Secret?

If you're a member of the House Republican Conference, and you're not a part of the "in crowd," you certainly do. As it turns out, in addition to the official rules package that the House adopted on Monday, there is a secret three-page addendum that was produced as part of the negotiations. Most GOP members of the House don't know exactly what's in it, and those who do are keeping their lips zipped.

Note that at least some portions of the agreement are known, by process of elimination. That is to say, it is known that Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) agreed to put three hardliners on the House Rules Committee and to hold show votes on a whole bunch of issues. Those things are not in the official rules so, ipso facto, they must be in the secret document. But that's not enough to fill three pages, and so there are at least some things that are still to be revealed. Well, assuming they ever are revealed.

Meanwhile, let's take a closer look at the resolution that the House passed, and that includes the rules that people are actually allowed to know about. In addition to making it much easier to bring a motion to vacate the speakership, and to pass legislation cutting federal employees' salaries, here are some of the other changes implemented by House Republicans:

• Proxy voting is no more.
  
  
• A Select Committee to look into COVID-19 has been established.
  
  
• The House Ethics Committee has been significantly weakened.
  
  
• The Congressional Budget Office is ordered to produce dynamic scores of major legislation. That means that, in addition to the direct economic impact of legislation (for example, "we're spending $70 billion on subsidies for aerospace firms"), the CBO has to guess as to the economic impact of that spending (for example, "that $70 billion will lead to 5,000 new jobs, which will produce $5 billion in income tax revenue, and will trigger the construction of 10,000 houses, which will produce $3 billion in corporate tax revenue," etc.). The clear purpose of this change is to make tax-cutting bills look less costly.
  
  
• There are two anti-abortion bills, H.R. 7 and H.R. 26, already cued up.
  
  
• Members are now required, in theory, to keep their bills to a single subject. Easier said than done, since even the omnibus bills the right-wingers hate technically have one subject (e.g., the budget).
  
  
• House floor privileges for territorial governors and the mayor of Washington, D.C. have been revoked. That covers a grand total of six people, five of them Democrats, and the sixth (Arnold Palacios of the Northern Mariana Islands) an independent.
  
  
• Lobbyists who used to work in the Capitol are no longer allowed to use the Capitol gym. Who said the House Republican Conference doesn't care about governance?

Recall, once again, that these are the things that McCarthy and his leadership are acknowledging publicly. One can only imagine what things might be so problematic that they are worse than, say, reducing ethical oversight. What's abundantly clear, however, is that the MAGA crew is calling the shots right now. The abortion bills, to take one example, were added to the rules package and to the House calendar without any consultation of the moderate Republicans. This is a situation ripe for a rebellion, either from the right, or from the center.

In related news, McCarthy got himself across the finish line with a bunch of negotiating and a whole bunch of concessions to the MAGA 20. On the other hand, playing no role whatsoever? Donald Trump. The former president lobbied hard for his loyalists to support McCarthy, and then claimed credit when McCarthy finally got over the hump. But, as it turns out, Trump didn't swing a single vote.

Note also that the clown show, or the pi**ing contest, or whatever you wish to call it, is already in full swing. Yesterday, House Republicans approved the formation of a committee that will investigate the "weaponization" of the federal government under the leadership of Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH). The vote was entirely along party lines. Meanwhile, Rep. Pat Fallon (R-TX) decided he wanted to beat the rush, and filed the first impeachment articles of the 118th Congress (targeting, in this case, DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas). Of course, the Democrats know how to pi** too, so they filed an ethics complaint against Rep. "George Santos" (R-NY).

No wonder more than 50 members left the House before the 2022 elections. They knew to get out while the gettin' was good. (Z)