Endless Stunt Investigations is All the House GOP Has Done, Because It's All They Can Agree Upon

Back in January, I registered a prediction that the only thing the new House GOP majority would do with its newfound power would be launch endless stunt investigations into the Biden administration because they literally can't agree on anything else.

That's the shot, here's the chaser.

That chart is obviously a bit misleading in presentation, but the ultimate payoff is still right: this House has been historically unproductive in actually enacting laws. Unsurprising, given that the governing party is a completely dysfunctional mess. The only thing they can do is authorize blatant fishing expedition impeachment inquiries literally justified by the fact that they haven't actually found any evidence of an impeachable offense yet.

How embarrassing for them. But how heartening for my predictive capabilities! (nb: this was actually an incredibly easy prediction to make).

Endless Stunt Investigations is All the House GOP Will Do, Because It's All They Can Agree Upon

Having finally secured his chair as House Speaker, Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) has given his caucus marching orders -- and those orders are "do nothing but launch petty performative investigations of the Biden administration".

Kevin McCarthy has told House Republicans to treat every committee like the Oversight panel — that is, use every last bit of authority to dig into the Biden administration. That work begins in earnest this week.

Several sprawling probes — largely directed at President Joe Biden, his family and his administration — set the stage for a series of legal and political skirmishes between the two sides of Pennsylvania Avenue. It’s all with an eye on the true battle, the 2024 election, as Biden flirts with a reelection run and House Republicans hope to expand their control to the White House.

After two impeachments of former President Donald Trump and a select committee that publicly detailed his every last move to unsuccessfully overturn the 2020 election results, GOP lawmakers are eager to turn the spotlight. And their conservative base is hoping for fireworks, calling on Republican leaders to grill several Biden world figures, including Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, retired chief medical adviser Anthony Fauci and presidential son Hunter Biden.

This isn't at all surprising, of course. In fact, it was probably inevitable after the Speaker vote fiasco exposed just how bitterly divided the GOP is (and how in thrall it is to its nihilist caucus). They're never going to forward an affirmative policy agenda, since they can't agree on any particulars beyond sloganeering (and also, policies tend to require money, which the GOP adamantly refuses to raise or spend unless it is on gut-busting upper-bracket tax cuts). But investigations? That doesn't require any policy agenda at all -- that's just mugging for the camera and talking about how much they hate Democrats. Right in their wheelhouse! 

That the GOP is still nursing ludicrous levels of grievance over the terrible unfairness of a House panel exposing why coups are bad only exacerbates their belief that this is naught but turnabout being fair play. And as the New York Times reported the other day, the GOP's view of "investigations" is to take it as a divine axiom that they and theirs are being abused, then pursue that axiom to hell and back no matter how little evidence ends up supporting the proposition.

So this is entirely within expectations for the new GOP House. Expect nothing but loud yelling investigations for two years as they throw everything they can at a wall and wait for something to stick. They don't agree on or even believe in anything else, but they can agree on doing that.

Performative Brinksmanship is Obviously Stupid from the Outside

The farce that is the GOP House leadership fight continues, as Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) has just lost the eleventh ballot for speaker in the face of a small but entrenched far-right rebellion. The knot of far-right extremists who refuse to back McCarthy has led to chaos in the GOP, with no signs of a compromise being reached. Ringleader Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) has even indicated that he'd be fine if the fallout of his putsch results in Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) ascending to the speaker position (though if a compromise is reached with Democrats to thwart the right-wing rebellion, I suspect it will not involve Jeffries as speaker).

For the most part, pretty much everyone on the left-side of the political spectrum has been content to sit back, munch on popcorn, and watch the GOP eat itself alive. Democrats are enjoying making a show of unity against GOP irresponsibility; meanwhile, Republicans are literally arguing that their decision to cripple the House doesn't matter because if a real crisis occurs President Biden will be there to set things right (the infantilization of the American right continues apace). The whole thing is one ongoing trainwreck for the GOP, and I absolutely agree with what I take to be the Democratic Party conventional wisdom that we need not lift a finger to bail out the GOP unless we get some superb concessions for our trouble.

So here's my question for the peanut gallery. I'm sure the arson caucus of the GOP has its boosters among other far-right extremists. But is there anybody on the left side of the spectrum observing what's happening here and thinking "I may not agree with their policies, but this is a savvy play by Gaetz and co."? Does anybody think this sort of performative brinksmanship is smart politics?

It doesn't seem so to me -- progressives right now are laughing our heads off at a GOP in complete disarray, and rightfully so. We're not jealous of the far-right for having the gumption to take a stand; we see just how catastrophic this whole farce is for the conservative agenda (and thank god for that!).

So perhaps there's a lesson to be learned here. Thankfully, there are few if any Democratic equivalents to the bomb throwers currently making chaos in the House. Even our far-left members so far have known when to rein it in -- a quality which sometimes yields loud cries of "betrayal!" and "spineless!" from certain corners of the commentariat. I might suggest that next time such an instinct comes over you, you remember this moment. Remember how you didn't look across the aisle and marvel at the steely-eyed rebels who stood their ground and played hardball. Remember how what you actually saw was a bunch of children embarrassing themselves and self-sabotaging for their own self-aggrandizement. And then remember that it's probably a bad idea for Democratic progressives to emulate the GOP's dumbest members' most nihilist strategies.

UPDATE: And the winner for the first prominent left outlet to praise the GOP's political savvy and declare it a model to emulate is ... Jacobin Mag! Who's shocked?

Anti-Pelosi Democrats are 2018's Stein Voters

The attempted rebellion of about a dozen and a half Democrats -- primarily "moderates" -- against Nancy Pelosi is a nice reminder that self-indulgent posturing in the service of self-destructive politics isn't just a feature of the progressive movement's left flank. Anybody can play!

There isn't any good reason for why Nancy Pelosi shouldn't be Speaker of the House, and the rebel faction has barely offered one other than some vague murmurings about "change" (I'm having flashbacks just writing that sentence). But the political calculations here are, if anything, even worse. Let's review:

• Not to put too fine a point on it, but the broad argument that Nancy Pelosi is a weight dragging Democratic electoral chances seems to have been rather decisively falsified by our massive gains nationwide a few weeks ago.
• Speaking of which, the political storyline with respect to the House should be "Democrats pick up nearly 40 seats in a crushing blue wave", followed closely by "Donald Trump is terrified of a House with subpoena power." But let's step all over that story in favor of yet another "Dems in disarray" narrative the media loves so much! Nothing says "the adults are back in town" like immediately collapsing into petty infighting!
• The idea that the savvy political move right now in the Democratic Party is to step on perhaps the most prominent female elected official in the party in service of a tack to the center is ... let's go with "counterintuitive."
• Even in swing districts, the number of independent voters who realistically are making their D-or-R voting decision based on whether Nancy Pelosi is speaker is charitably described as "trivial". And of that set, the number who will care about something as an inside-baseball-y as the vote for Speaker cannot be measured by any instrument known to man. Put differently: if someone is going to vote Republican because Nancy Pelosi is speaker, it's cute to think they'd make an exception for a Democrat who voted against Pelosi on the floor.
• To the extent that anyone who promised to "not vote for Pelosi for speaker" needs a face-saving measure, the solution clearly is "vote for someone else in the caucus meeting". Then -- once you lose that vote by a predictably crushing margin -- say you've fulfilled your promise to "vote for someone else" and fall back in line like a good soldier. If that sounds too clever by half, keep in mind we are dealing with a hypothetical class of voters who will hold a grudge over the House leadership vote for two years, yet apparently won't be influenced by or care about anything the House actually does over that time period.

Honestly, there's nothing more "Democrat" than a bunch of sanctimonious morons deciding that opposing Trump is way less fun than a few weeks of needlessly self-destructive intraparty fratricide. 

The only pleasant thing about this whole affair will be watching Pelosi crush the insurgents like bugs. See, unlike them, Nancy Pelosi actually does know how to play the political game.

Cross-Racial Representation in the House

Daily Kos Elections has an interesting post listing those House members who represent a district whose population is either majority- or plurality of a different race (e.g., a White member representing a plurality Latino district).

I was a bit surprised at the partisan diversity here. There are, for example, 30 majority- or plurality-white districts represented by a non-White member. Of those, eight are Republican (five Latinos, two Native Americans, and one African-American). There are 21 majority- or plurality-Latino districts represented by non-Latinos, of which five are Republican-represented (four Whites, one African-American).

Anyway, it's an interesting list to poke around in. Have a look.

Who Knew One's Obligations as a Public Servant Would Sometimes Cause Discomfort?

South Florida Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R), the longest serving member of Florida's congressional delegation, has announced her retirement. Her departure presents a major Democratic pickup opportunity in a district that his shifted hard to the left in recent years (Hillary Clinton beat Donald Trump there by a punishing 20 point margin).

It's not that I begrudge her retirement. I can't imagine now is a fun time to be a Republican Congresswomen, particularly for some like Ros-Lehtinen who is, if not moderate, then at least idiosyncratic. Carrying water for Donald Trump doesn't seem appealing, but neither does full-throated opposition to her own party's chief standard bearer. It's the same reason Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-UT) announced his retirement:

Like everyone else, [Chaffetz] assumed Hillary Clinton would win the election and provide him with endless fodder for high-profile investigations from his perch as chairman of the Oversight Committee. He'd be on the front page all the time, doing CNN hits, and just generally gaining lots of name recognition for the next step in his career. President Chaffetz? It could happen!

Then Trump won. Suddenly the Oversight Committee was all but shut down. There would be no investigations. In fact, it was even worse than that. There was a real possibility that Trump would do something so outrageous that Chaffetz would have no choice but to hold hearings. Then he'd really be in trouble. He'd be caught between loyalty to party and the need to avoid looking like a total shill. It's a lose-lose proposition.

Not that I think Ros-Lehtinen harbored presidential ambitions, but you get the idea. Being in Congress just isn't fun anymore for any Republican who -- whether by position or by principle -- finds themselves uneasy by Trump and his antics.

At the same time, there is something rather pathetic about this. Oh, it's uncomfortable to be in a position where one could be expected to operate as a check against your own party's President when he behaves recklessly or promotes outrageous policies? We can't have that now can we! Best retire and kick the can to someone else. Nobody could reasonably expect that those multiple decades of seniority and public service actually be put to use to protect the damn country!

Whatever, I'm cranky. The point is that it doesn't seem like Rep. Ros-Lehtinen is interested in doing her job anymore to the extent that her job would entail policing the Trump administration and thus antagonizing fellow Republicans. So it's probably better, all in all, that Florida voters get the chance to put into office someone who will step up to the plate.

La Foule, C'est Moi

The Washington Post has a fun article about how members of the far-right Freedom Caucus who have agreed to back Rep. Paul Ryan's speakership bid are now in the unfamiliar position of being assailed as "RINOs" and "traitors" by their own constituents. You know, the ones they spent the last few years whipping into a frenzy about how the vast majority of Republicans are "RINOs" and "traitors"? Anyway, the whole piece is good, but my favorite part is definitely is the concluding question asked of Rep. Ken Buck (R-CO):

Asked Thursday if he expects pitchforks back home, Buck said he did not: “I’m the guy with the pitchfork.”

"Am I worried about the blindly enraged, braying mob? Hell, I'm part of the blindly enraged, braying mob!"

Learning What Should Be Quiet and What Should Be Loud

House Republicans are not pleased with their Speaker-apparent, Rep. Kevin McCarthy (CA), who went on Hannity the other day and bragged about how the Benghazi investigation had "succeeded" by tarnishing the reputation of Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton. Since, for obvious reasons, Republicans do not like publicly admitting the partisan nature of the record-setting Benghazi investigation, this was a major faux-pas. Which raises the question: How could an experienced operator like Rep. McCarthy make such an obvious blunder?

Some folks are chalking it up to inexperience at being under the microscope of the Speakership (or near-Speakership). But I doubt that -- while it is true that the scrutiny level has been turned up, McCarthy is not some obscure back-bencher unused to political realities. Rather, I think this was a failed attempt to positively signal the Tea Party sorts who were Boehner's bane. McCarthy, like Boehner, is more of an establishment sort of GOPer, and he's had a front row seat as the hard right savaged his boss straight into an early retirement. And what does the Tea Party like to do? It likes to attack! It doesn't cower before the lamestream media or pretend that politics is beanbag or seek to reason with the current socialist regime. They hated Boehner because they saw him as seeking to appease the Democrats rather than fight for conservative values. And so note how McCarthy's statement about Hillary's Benghazi-inspired poll drop concludes: "No one would have known any of that had happened had we not fought."

Poor McCarthy. He thought he was saying something the right had yearned to hear out loud for once, but it turned out that even the Tea Party knows to keep overt partisan political investigations on the quiet side of the ledger. Well, this is a learning process for all of us.

Four More Years! The Post-Election Recap

Nowadays, virtually nobody gets to read this. But I still like writing it. So here goes.

* Obviously, congratulations to newly re-elected President Barack Obama, who ended up winning by a decently comfortable electoral vote margin. I'm pretty confident he will win Florida, thus giving a final electoral tally of 332 to 206 for Romney. Not half bad (and a perfect call by Nate Silver, incidentally). After all this rigmarole, only two states changed sides (both blue-to-red): Indiana and North Carolina. Coming down from a pretty high tide in 2008, that's impressive work.

* Laura Ingraham thinks the problem here was that the GOP didn't nominate "a conservative". Interesting theory! Let's compare Mitt Romney's performance in Minnesota to that of no-questions-asked conservative Rep. Michele Bachmann. Bachmann represents Minnesota's reddest seat, but barely squeaked out a victory over Jim Graves. In suburban Anoka County -- Bachmann's base -- she ran 2 points behind Romney. Benton County, 10 points behind. Carver County, 8 points back. Sherbourne county, 12 points back. In Wright County, Bachmann was 14 points behind Romney's base. Romney won Stearns County by 12 and Bachmann lost by 12 -- a 24 point swing. By all means, run a Bachmann in a swing state and see what happens.

* The real impressive story for me tonight was superb Democratic defense in the Senate. Democrats were defending more than twice as many seats as Republicans, many won during the 2006 Democratic wave year. And yet, big blue is going to come out in the Senate ahead of where they started: picking up Indiana, Massachusetts, and Maine (assuming, as I believe very likely, that King will caucus with Democrats) while only losing Nebraska. Some of this comes down to Republicans shooting themselves in the foot with awful candidates (Indiana, Missouri, Michigan, Florida), but not all. Scott Brown ran a very good campaign in Massachusetts, but Elizabeth Warren is no Martha Coakley, and that state's blue roots shone through. Rick Berg was a fine candidate in North Dakota, but Heidi Heitkamp was absolutely stellar and scored a huge upset. Montana was an even-odds fight between two candidates with state-wide recognition, in which incumbent Democrat Jon Tester prevailed.

* Both Nevada and Arizona ended up being tantalizing close, but I have different views on them. In Nevada, the Democratic candidate (Shelley Berkley) underperformed -- this is a state where Democrats can and should be competing in right now, so that was a disappointment. In Arizona, though, Richard Carmona wildly overperformed expectations for a novice candidate. I think Arizona has only a cycle, maybe two, before it is a true swing state. The Latino charge there is going to overwhelm Republicans.

* Speaking of Latinos, man, that is really going to be a problem for Republicans in coming years. Give Bush and Rove credit -- they saw this coming and really tried to neutralize the demographic threat by trying to make their party the one of immigration reform and thus a viable choice for Latino voters. But they couldn't get it through Congress, and now they're reaping the rewards. Each year, it becomes harder and harder for Republicans to win with a virtually all-White base -- they need to make inroads with non-White voters to even have a prayer. And each year, the Republican base contracts into a more and more pure angry White core which will flip out and any non-trivial gesture in that direction. It will be interesting to see how that shakes out.

* Speaking of Latinos, part II: Puerto Ricans voted in favor of statehood yesterday! This has been a long controversy on the island, as residents have been divided as to whether they want independence, statehood, the status quo, or "sovereign free association" (basically, more autonomy). Statehood had never gotten more than 50% of the vote until today. I don't know the precise procedures that come next, but assuming they go and formally apply for statehood, this has the potential to be a massive headache for the GOP. My understanding is that the island of Puerto Rico isn't as "blue" as mainland Puerto Ricans are (from 2005-2009 their non-voting resident commissioner in Congress was a Republican, for example), but it still definitely would lean left. If I'm the Democratic Party, I immediately welcome them with open arms, and then watch as the GOP commits fratricide between the section that screams "brown brown Spanish-speaking brown!" and the section that understands exactly what message that sends to Latinos nationwide.

* House-wise, the story here is excellent redistricting work by Republicans that basically made this election a wash -- pretty amazing, given the big GOP gains last time around. For all the great recruiting they did Senate-side, Democrats often were a little more scattershot with their House work, and it showed.

* Still, there were some excellent scalps taken last night. By far my favorite was the throttling of (soon-to-be-ex-!) Rep. Joe Walsh (R-IL) at the hands of Tammy Duckworth. Among his many, many sins, Walsh's support for a one-state solution makes him, in my view, the automatic most anti-Israel member of Congress. So I'm thrilled. Also, war criminal Allen West is down in the FL-18, though that looks to be headed to recount land.

* Gubernatorial races were basically a wash -- Republicans netted one in North Carolina, and that was it. I have to say, statewide Democratic candidates in the upper plains (Dakotas and Montana) are showing impressive resiliency.

* The state legislative picture also sounds good for Democrats, though things are a bit spottier there. The DFL has taken over both chambers in Minnesota, giving them the trifecta. They also took over both houses in Maine, and, in a pretty sizable upset given the ferocious gerrymander they were up against, the New York State Senate. Democrats also made some critical holds onto razor-thin margins in the Iowa Senate and the Nevada Senate, among others. I'll want to look into the full lay of the land a bit more, but it seems downballot this was a very, very good day.

* In 2008, I noted that there was something especially wounding about the losses we incurred on the gay marriage front that year, given that voters were primed to see it as a "historic" election and yet still made a conscious decision to exclude gay and lesbian citizens from that promise. Today, at least some of the demons have been exorcised. Gay marriage votes ran the table nationwide, with it earning legalization in Maine, Maryland, and Washington, and defeating an anti-gay marriage amendment in Minnesota. And, to be blunt, every year more of their voters die, and more of ours come of age. This is a battle where the tide might have finally turned for good.

* Beyond the gay marriage front, it was a pretty good ballot measure day too. Maryland also passed a state level DREAM act giving in-state tuition to resident illegal alien children. That's the first time one of those laws has passed through a popular ballot. Meanwhile, Minnesota somewhat surprisingly rejected the voter ID amendment -- I'd basically resigned myself to the idea that voter ID was a terrible policy idea that was too intuitively appealing to ever be defeated, so truly stellar work by the "no" campaign there to knock it down.

* And that's a wrap, everyone! Still a few outstanding races to decide, probably some recounts to manage, but we're done for another two years. Best of luck to the President on his second term!

One Decade On, One Decade Off

Ex.-Rep. Bob Shamansky (D-OH) died last week. He only served one term in Congress, during the 1980s, so he wasn't that notable for his political accomplishments. Rather, what is fascinating about him is the temporal range of his career. Shamansky ran for Congress in 1966, in 1980 (when he won), 1982 (when he lost the seat he won), and 2006. In other words, he ran in three separate decades, with an "off" decade in between each.

I have to think that's unique. Condolences to Rep. Shamansky's loved ones.

Cheering up the Base

Right-wing Rep. Michael Burgess (R-TX) met with some of his Tea Party supporters who were unhappy that he eventually supporting a debt ceiling increase. Responsible governing being an anathema to the base, Burgess promised to cast no such vote again.

But he still needed to do something to placate angry conservative, something that would provide a more effective way of obstructing the President's agenda (clearly, one of the major failures of the Republican Congress has been its inability to effectively obstruct). And he thinks he's got the answer: impeachment!

When one attendee suggested that the House push for impeachment proceedings against President Barack Obama to obstruct the president from pushing his agenda, Burgess was receptive.

"It needs to happen, and I agree with you it would tie things up," Burgess said. "No question about that."

When asked about the comment later, Burgess said he wasn't sure whether the proper charges to bring up articles of impeachment against Obama were there, but he didn't rule out pursuing such a course.

"We need to tie things up," Burgess said. "The longer we allow the damage to continue unchecked, the worse things are going to be for us."

Undoubtedly, when the founders included an impeachment provision in the Constitution, they meant it to be just one more tool for a recalcitrant Congress to use for delay. Hell, Burgess doesn't even know what charges would be appropriate. That step comes later -- the important thing is to further "tie things up."

All Teed Up

Dear Anderson Cooper,

I know it was an eventful night what with the Republican Party being massive fuck-ups, but you can't interview Rep. Joe Walsh (R-IL) and not ask him whether he's massively delinquent on child support. I mean that story just broke! Do you think that if the Democrats anointed Rep. David Wu (OR) to speak for them tonight, folks wouldn't ask about his alleged sexual assault? Trick question -- David Wu would never take on the voice of a leading Democrat right now.

Meanwhile, my dad says that if Boehner can't rustle up the votes for this plan, he's got to resign as Speaker. Not in the "out of shame" sense (though sure), but in the "he clearly doesn't have the ability to control his own caucus anymore" sense.

Shuler's New Seat?

DKos elections wonders if Rep. Heath Shuler (D-NC), widely rumored to be retiring in order to take a position as Athletic Director at Tennessee but who just issued a statement nixing that, may run in the newly drawn NC-10? That district is currently represented by Rep. Patrick McHenry (R), one of the dimmest bulbs in the House (and that's saying something) who declared his vote against the Voting Rights Act a strike against "political correctness".

I'm not the biggest Shuler fan (I am from DC, after all), but I would be willing to forgive a lot if he was able to knock off McHenry.

Maryland Redistricting

Maryland already possesses some of the most bizarrely gerrymandered congressional lines in the country. Some of that is due to the Chesapeake Bay making any line look fuzzy, but not all of it -- the bizarre quad-helix thing going on in Baltimore is truly a gem of the genre. Currently, it has produced a 6-2 Democratic split in the congressional delegation, which, to be fair, isn't totally out of line given the sharp Democratic bent of the state.

But Democratic leaders are going to the drawing board in an effort to make it 7-1. The presumed target had been freshman Rep. Andy Harris (R) of the 1st District (Eastern Shore), but Josh Kurtz is reporting that intense lobbying from Rep. Donna Edwards (D) has instead caused state lawmakers to shift their aim towards the 6th District's Roscoe Bartlett (R), representing the western part of the state.

I like ex-Rep. Frank Kratovil (D), who won the 1st District in an upset in 2006 and seems like a nice enough guy. But Bartlett is going to be 86 years old, and folks raise a good point when they note that the exurbs which would anchor a reformulated 6th district are trending our way. Edwards herself volunteered to take on some deep-red territory (no skin off her back, she won with 83% last time out), and the 8th District (Chris Van Hollen -- and my home turf) probably could do so as well, as we no longer need to pack Democrats in to oust Connie Morella.

The only question is whether the lines can be drawn in a way that looks a little more sane than they do now.

Hello Lucy

I hadn't gotten around to giving my two thumbs up to the Democrat's "Lucy and the football" trick the other day, apparently concocted by my home state's Rep. (and Minority Whip) Steny Hoyer (D-MD). For those of you who don't know, Republicans brought to the floor a far-right budget proposed by the Republican Study Conference -- one that goes way beyond the radical cuts proposed by the Paul Ryan budget. The plan was for it to fail thanks to a coalition of Democrats and moderate Republicans.

But the Democratic leadership had a light bulb: "Why do your dirty work for you?" If the majority of the GOP majority wants the RSC budget, the country needs to know that. So late in the vote, the vast majority of the Democratic caucus switched its vote to "present". Suddenly, the RSC bill had a majority among those voting (i.e., among Republicans), and the House leadership was faced with the terrifying possibility that the damn thing might actually pass. Chaos ensued.

Eventually, the GOP whipped enough of its members into switching sides so the bill failed. But it was a great piece of political theater that showed both the willingness of many Republicans to embrace radical, retrograde budget ideas, as well as many of their members' utter hollowness when it comes to putting their money where their mouths are.

Incidentally, with respect to the Representatives who switched under pressure, I say "no mercy". Slap an ad up saying they "were willing to vote for [insert insanely scary cuts]", and hammer them on it all the way to election day.

House Committee Chairs Released

Here's the list of who will be chairing the various House Committees.

Agriculture: Frank D. Lucas (Okla.)

Appropriations: Hal Rogers (Ky.)

Armed Services: Howard P. "Buck" McKeon (Calif.)

Budget: Paul Ryan (Wis.)

Education and Labor: John Kline (Minn.)

Energy and Commerce: Fred Upton Mich.)

Financial Services: Spencer Bachus (Ala.)

Foreign Affairs: Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (Fla.)

Homeland Security: Peter T. King (N.Y.)

Judiciary: Lamar S. Smith (Texas)

Natural Resources: Doc Hastings (Wash.)

Oversight & Government Reform: Darrell Issa (Calif.)

Science & Technology: Ralph M. Hall (Texas)

Small Business: Sam Graves (Mo.)

Transportation & Infrastructure: John L. Mica (Fla.)

Veterans: Jeff Miller (Fla.)

Ways & Means: Dave Camp (Mich.)

Obviously, no Republican whose in a position to become a Committee chair is going to be someone who I'd truly like to see in the position. But there is some silver lining. John Kline on Education and Labor isn't bad -- I saw him at the first congressional hearing on employment discrimination against the transgendered, and he wasn't bad. Fred Upton on Energy and Commerce is notable because it means Rep. Joe "I'd like to apologize to BP" Barton (R-TX) isn't chairing it, which can only be a good thing.

On the other hand, there are, as expected, some catastrophes. All signs point to Darrell Issa leading a 1990s style witch-hunt against the Obama administration -- something all the more dangerous because Issa is a very smart, very effective, and very incisive Congressman. Putting Peter King -- the man who publicly wondered if Eric Holder is on the side of al-Qaeda (rich given that King is one of the few congressman who did, in fact, openly ally with actual terrorists) -- is a joke. In Lamar Smith, we have an extremist who once spoke at a conference where speakers advocating executing American judges who were insufficiently right-wing.

And then there's all the rest. Paul Ryan has a reputation for wonkishness, but it's not one that seems grounded in any actual mastery of economic facts, so much as it's grading on a massive, massive curve accounting for the anti-intellectual bent of the GOP mainstream. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen will insure that our policy towards Cuba will stay on the same failed trajectory it's been on for the past 40 years (and if that means sabotaging Israel, so be it), but other than amount of rhetoric devoted to the issue it's probably no real change. Spencer Bachus at least had the balls to call out Sarah Palin for something.

Griffith Bolts to the GOP

Alabama Democratic Representative Parker Griffith is switching parties, citing differences with party leaders (particularly over health care) as the cause.

Obviously, Rep. Griffith has every right to do this (as did Senator James Jeffords, or Arlen Specter, or any other historical party switcher). Republican leaders, furthermore, are surely correct to trumpet the implications of a House member deciding to defect to the minority, which I imagine is a rarity. On the other hand, Matt Yglesias is also correct to note that Griffith came from a district whose Democratic control was essentially unsustainable over the long term. Rep. Griffith was the furthest thing from being a progressive while he was a Democrat; so progressives already understood that we would need to know how to push our agenda forward without him.

Something Completely Different

Kos endorses the Republican in the NY-23 special House election. The reasoning is a mix of two factors: a) the Republican genuinely does seem more liberal than the Democrat (such that there is a "Conservative Party" candidate in the race who is actually competitive with the field), b) overflowing spite towards "blue dog" Democrats, of whom this Democrat would undoubtedly become a part of if elected.

Still, intriguing.

UPDATE: Meanwhile, significant portions of the GOP apparatus are getting behind said Conservative Party candidate over their own nominee. So Democrats are supporting a Republican who they think is more liberal than the Democrat, while Republicans, noting this, are supporting a third-party candidate firmly in tea bag territory, thus throwing the advantage to ... who, exactly? I have no idea.

House (Democrats) Disapprove of Wilson

The House of Representatives has passed, mostly along party lines, a resolution formally "disapproving" of South Carolina Rep. Joe Wilson's (R) "you lie!" outburst towards Barack Obama at his recent address to Congress. The 240-179 vote came after Wilson refused a last ditch plea by Democratic leaders to apologize himself on the House floor.

As usual, I'm less interested in the vote than in the folks who broke from form:

Even though the vote was largely partisan, there were a few departures from party loyalty. Seven Republicans voted to rebuke Wilson: Rep. Joseph Cao of Louisiana, Joanne Emerson of Missouri, Jeff Flake of Arizona, Walter Jones of North Carolina, Tom Petri of Wisconsin, Dana Rohrabacher of California and fellow South Carolinian Bob Inglis.

But 12 Democrats voted no on the resolution: Michael Arcuri of New York, Bill Delahunt of Massachusetts, Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona, Maurice Hinchey of New York, Paul Hodes of New Hampshire, Dennis Kucinich of Ohio, Dan Maffei of New York, Eric Massa of New York, James McDermott of Washington, Gwen Moore of Wisconsin, Gene Taylor of Mississippi and Harry Teague of Arizona.

Odd list, on both sides. Rep. Cao is a gimme for Republicans, and Rep. Inglis was one of the first to say that Rep. Wilson should have apologized. Rep. Flake has also periodically demonstrated an ability to stand on principle, so good for him. Rep. Jones may be eying another tough re-election fight. [UPDATE: Definitely got Walter Jones confused with Robin Hayes, who already lost his "another tough re-election fight". Whoops!] Rep. Emerson has been trending more moderate for some time now, Rep. Petri is also reasonably centrist, and Rep. Rohrabacher has always been a bit of a wild card.

The Democratic list is, if anything, more eclectic still. You have staunch progressives like Reps. Kucinich, Delahunt, and McDermott, some random back-benches like Rep. Hinchey, some folks with higher ambitions like Rep. Hodes, and some folks from reasonbly marginal districts like Reps. Maffei, Taylor, Giffords, and Teague. Rep. Moore appears to be the only African-American Representative to vote against the resolution (you wonder if some weren't holding out for a harsher censure motion).

Campaign Mode

If one were designing a video game about Congressional elections, the career of Rep. Steve Cohen (D-TN) would represent a good template for a campaign mode. Representing a majority-Black, heavily Democratic area of Memphis, Cohen got elected to Congress in 2006 by emerging from a badly split Democratic primary field. In 2008, Cohen didn't have the luxury of a split field, but soundly trounced corporate attorney Nikki Tinker who tried to race- and religion-bait her way to victory. Now, his 2010 match-up is another step-up in competition, facing long-time Memphis Mayor Willie Herenton.

This NYT profile makes it sound like Herenton is basically trying to make the campaign about race. It didn't work for Tinker at all, but Herenton is far higher profile than Tinker ever was. Still, Cohen has had time to entrench himself and appears to have engendered some loyalty amongst his constituents -- Black and White. I'm optimistic about his chances. Though an intervention by Barack Obama in favor of one of the most progressive members of the Democratic caucus would be, I think, both politically wise and greatly appreciated by Rep. Cohen.