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Paul Ryan for Speaker?
With Kevin McCarthy out, Rep. Paul Ryan is — inevitably — under immense pressure to run for speaker of the house and to give Boehner a way out of it. Ryan, however, has made it abundantly clear for years that he does not want the job.
Every politician under the sun talks about their family when choosing not to run for some higher office, so it’s no surprise that Ryan says he wants to be based in Janesville, Wisconsin and see his three kids as much as possible. But every remotely fair-minded reporter I’ve read ends up convinced that Paul Ryan actually means it and isn’t merely being coy.
He also means it when he says — as he has for years — that he’s a policy guy, not a political guy. He doesn’t want to round up votes; he wants to focus on ideas. He’s in his niche right now, and not easily replaced. Forcing him into a job outside his natural talent could destroy his ability to be the party’s de facto policy leader, and he knows it. And yet, if he were persuaded it were his duty for the good of the country, I think he would do it.
Ryan holds the respect of much of the caucus in a way neither Boehner nor McCarthy could. Even as some conservatives urge Rep. Trey Gowdy to run, Gowdy took himself out — and essentially endorsed a theoretical Ryan bid.
Does Ryan, after all, have the talent to do the job Boehner and McCarthy can’t? Or would it simply be a cruel waste of policy talent and an honorable reputation to put him in an impossible job he does not want?
It is beyond my judgment, and most of ours. God give the man wisdom.
Image Credit: By love4utah [CC BY 2.0], via Wikimedia Commons
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Then we’re screwed. This political year is beginning to look for the Republicans like the 1968 and 1972 Democratic years when they had total chaos and were suppose to win. They didn’t win. Our current Republican party is in complete disarray and unless we all pull it together, we ain’t going to win either.
I agree with that. I don’t understand what this anti establishment group is trying to do. Shutting down the government has never, ever worked. They are tearing down their own party with no credible plan to replace any one. Yes, we’re frustrated. But realize we’re frustrated because of checks and balances. We don’t have a super majority to over ride Obama’s veto. There’s nothing wrong with a tactical pause until we get the presidency. Be satisfied we’ve blocked his agenda.
Part of the frustration comes from not seeing that agenda blocked. Partly because there are things we’re not seeing — everything he would do if he could. Partly because he’s going around Congress with every tool at his disposal.
And Congress doesn’t have a magic tool to fix that — but it is infuriating.
There are plenty who are. They’re getting called “establishment shills” for their efforts.
Sounds like Boehner is still playing the “my way or the highway” game. That makes him a hardliner.
It’s hard to say what the right thing for conservatives to do is. It depends on whether they are playing a short game or a long game, and if a long game, just how long.
I wouldn’t encourage them to rule out Ryan, but I would not jump to conclusions before hearing from Justin Amash. He tends to think things through pretty well.
Here’s a bit of what Amash said about it on his Facebook page a couple of days ago. Maybe we should try to get him on Ricochet:
Amash’s complaints all look legitimate to me.
But — from what I can tell watching these various crisis as a non-insider — the hardliners have contributed to the problem by trying to force leadership to do things with the crises that won’t work — and even if in some theoretical situation they might work they can’t work without the support of the whole caucus, and the hardliners haven’t been working to gain that.
That’s where Speaker Ryan could make a difference. Ryan doesn’t want the crisis-to-crisis situation either. But to stop it, he’s going to need them to back him on procedural votes. And after the Republicans have it out among themselves he’s going to need them to back him on whatever the majority of the majority settles on, even if it’s not their choice. If they’ll meet him on that point, perhaps the House truly could function effectively again. Or at least keep Republican infighting out of the news for the next 13 months.
If you can’t beat the guy even when he rolls over and plays dead for you, you can’t be shocked when he doesn’t have much respect for you… I fear that’s human nature and political reality.
Call Boehner a hardliner too if you want. I’m not trying to score any points from the term. I’m not bound to it. But I’ve seen no other term in common use that easily describes that group of congressmen so that everyone knows who is referred to.
The mainstream media is calling them “the conservatives.” I won’t do that because that implies none of the rest of them are conservative — which is utter nonsense — and some of them lean more libertarian (including Amash if I understand correctly?), and the disagreement is not primarily about ideology anyway. And moreover the media is using the term, and presenting the group, in such a way as to try to give conservatives in general a bad name.
If the Republican legislators are doing what their constituents want them to do, they may get to keep their seats. At least theoretically.