Republicans Change House Rules So They Don’t Embarrass Themselves Again

Republicans in the House of Representatives have already put forth their new rules package for the new Congress, and it contains a change to a rule that Matt Gaetz insisted upon two years ago. During the speakership battle between Gaetz and Kevin McCarthy, they agreed to change the rules to allow a single member to trigger a vote calling for a new Speaker, and this year Republicans are upping that threshold to avoid a single crybaby from being able to embarrass the entire Party. Ring of Fire’s Farron Cousins explains what’s happening.

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*This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any typos.

With their slim majority that they held in the House of Representatives over the last two years, Republicans in the house spent the last two years embarrassing themselves repeatedly, consistently just embarrassment after embarrassment. But none of the embarrassments were of course, as bad as the beginning of their term because two years ago, let us not forget how incompetent these bastards are. There was that protracted speaker battle, right? Kevin McCarthy wanted it so bad he could taste it. He was sure he was gonna get it. But then Matt Gaetz, which ironically actually McCarthy and Gates both now outta Congress, so that didn't work out well for either of them. Nevertheless, Gates and McCarthy had to sit down, do these negotiations. And finally, what sealed the deal for McCarthy was when he gave into Gates' demand that the New House rules say that only one vote is needed. One Republican member could stand up and say, I move for a vote of no confidence in the speaker, which would trigger a vote to remove the Speaker of the House, just one person.

That's all it would take. Well, that of course caused a lot of embarrassment for McCarthy as he was then ousted by Gates later on in the same year, and replaced by Mike Johnson, who of course is now kind of going through the same thing. But this time Republicans have said, you know what? Maybe let's not embarrass ourselves tremendously this time. So in their rules package that they unveiled this past Wednesday, that of course is not technically official yet, right? They still gotta get their speaker and then they gotta vote on the rules. But the new rules raise that threshold from one Republican to nine Republicans, because they don't want to end up in the same situation where they look like a bunch of incompetent babies and fools who don't know how to govern. And I gotta tell you, after watching these morons for 20 years in American politics, this may be the only smart thing I've ever seen Republicans do.

This may be like the first time I have ever seen Republicans address a problem before it actually happens, even though it technically already happened, but they don't wanna look like the complete incompetent set of buffoons that they are, and McCarthy understands. He once again, uh, not McCarthy Johnson, excuse me, understands that he once again has a razor thin majority, even smaller than he had last year. So he's trying to make sure he doesn't lose the job. But this just shows you how petty they are. They can't trust themselves to keep a speaker, so how in the hell can we trust them to run this country? That is the question you should be asking yourself.