2y ago

House Republicans are jumping off the sinking ship

Have you noticed the rush of House Republicans calling it quits in the last few weeks?

Rep. Ken Buck (R-Colo.) announced his exit Nov. 1. He explained that to be a member of the Republican House majority means putting up with  the “many Republican leaders [who] are lying to America, claiming that the 2020 election was stolen.”

Buck is predicting that even more House Republicans will leave “in the near future.”

The day before Buck said good-bye, House Appropriations Chair Kay Granger (R-Texas) also quit. Granger had been a leader among House Republicans who prevented the far-right, election-denying Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) from becoming Speaker of the House.

Also in October, Rep. Debbie Lesko (R-Ariz.) said she was quitting. “Right now, Washington, D.C. is broken,” she said. “It is hard to get anything done.”

93 comments

This isn't a victory. They will just be replaced with Trumpites.
- Trumpite replacement candidates have been losing close congressional seats to Democratic challengers so this may open up some pathways to retaking a majority.
  
  It's a risk though. Many people vote party line. It will depend a lot on what district or state the seat is in.
- Exactly. The ones that are closer to being moderate (there are currently no moderate Republicans in the house) are leaving. They're less crazy in general, so not only are there fewer Republicans to push back against the MAGA crowd, it leaves spots open to be filled by even crazier Republicans.
- Yeah, I feel like the sinking ship is a "sane Republican party". We're just going to see more Boebert's, MTG's, and Jim Jordan's in Congress now, which will lead to even more dysfunction and gridlock.
  
  They know that they will be primaried by MAGoos, and will lose.
- The fact that there's even a debate to be had about whether it's a victory just shows how fucked up our system of government is—in this case, our electoral processes. Government policies in a democracy should be highly predictable based on what's popular with the voting-age public, but instead, the policy effects of something as minor as some people retiring are so unpredictable we may as well be trying to read the future in chicken entrails.
  
  I think part of that reason is due to the fact that half of Congress has an arbitrarily capped headcount and we're no longer able to represent the popular opinions of the constituency. Last I checked, we should have something like 3x the representatives in the house that we have currently.
  We also need to ditch the electoral college. There's no reason to have it any longer. We won a civil war that forced the South to start evolving beyond chattel slavery to prop up their economy, there's no need to continue with that farce.
- Rats fleeing a sinking ship that will be replaced by bigger, shittier rats.
- That is why the system needs to be transformed into a multi-party system. From now on, both parties will become more and more extreme.
  
  I've been voting in elections since the 90s and it's always been this way at least since my dad was voting in the late 60s.
  Breaking away from two parties is great talk, but there seems to be a lot of pushback from folks that are, for over reason or another, married to FPTP voting. We aren't ever going to move past the two party system until FPTP is thrown in the trash heap and private monetary political donations are banned outright.
  Also, no idea why anyone down voted you.
  
  Guess which party is trying to outlaw other RCV & already has in Florida?
  
  Did you like the chaos of not having a House Speaker as a small faction turned against the majority and held the entire chamber hostage?
  If so, then you would love coalition politics because that's a regular occurrence. If you consider the Freedom Caucus as a separate party in coalition with the GOP, then their antics will be familiar to anyone living under a multiparty system.
  Multiparty systems don't solve the problem of extremism, they normalize it. In Italy, Israel, and now the House, leaders must appease extremist factions to stay in power.
  
  I respectfully disagree. I think the GOP will keep marching towards the far right, but that will cause the Democrats to move to the center
  
  There's nothing extreme about the Democratic party. Get some fucking perspective.
Nice. Instead of staying to fight for America, they turn tail and run like the yellow bellied cunts they are.
- How many years did they spend sweeping the ground ahead of Trump and his cronies to support them and bring us to where we are today - only to act like they are taking some principled stand in quitting now?
  They made this bed.
- What else you expect? If they legitimately try to govern or talk sensibly, they get primaried. The GOP is so completely broken, there's no point trying to hang in there.
"right now Washington DC is broken"
Oh Debbie, it's not Washington honey. It's one specific party that happens to reside currently.
- Both can be true at the same time. The system itself is broken, and the fact that it allows fascists to gain so much traction is a symptom of that brokenness.
- I feel like both parties are broken. There's a systemic failure at large.
  We really need to get special interest money out of politics to keep lifers out past their usefulness. People too old to make actual decisions are only there because they are being propped up by the party so more money can be raised.
  
  Weird, I feel like "both sides" rhetoric is delusional and anyone spouting it at this point is covering for fascist garbage.
  Democrats have a corporate tit sucking problem and aren't doing enough. Republicans are trying to burn down the planet by doing the opposite of whatever knowledgeable people tell them should be done. These two groups are not the same, OBVIOUSLY.
  Every group has problems, Democrats are not angels. This is not news to anyone. "Ackthually, both sides" isn't a well considered rhetorical position, it's a suicide note.
  
  Both parties are indeed broken. Until we can get corporate money out of politics we will continue to have corrupt politicians who only serve their corporate overlords.
Easier to quit than actually try to fix what you broke in the first place.
- why put themselves at risk confronting the problems in the party, when they can just leave, with their money and influence, and let the crazies run the nuthouse
So the bastards are quitting the machine they built after it got out of hand and are leaving it to be run by crazy bastards.
- Yeah, but they'll be safe, because they were a Republican once, right? Right‽
Assholes rather flee than work with Democrats. Fucking trash
- More importantly, flee rather than fight the crazy
Rule: They are not allowed to become Democrats.
- She's only salty that Trump co-opted the religious right out from under the noses corporate GOP by out-crazying them.
The Moderates and old guard are leaving to be replaced by extreme right wing types.
- There really aren't any moderates.
  
  The moderates are the Democrats (on average). The majority of the Republican party supports treason so any that call themselves Republicans fall into that label as well.
I for one don’t think they are choosing to leave. I think they are being forced to leave. The GQP is holding Kompromat over their heads, and because they didn’t support Qult45 are being forced out, less all the evidences against them all come to light.
Now this is the Great Replacement theory I'm interested in. Soon, the right will only be Trump and his luddites.
Every Republican still in the House next year will be forced to run for reelection while possibly supporting a convicted felon at the head the GOP ticket. They will also have to say they believe the lie that the 2020 election was stolen. 
Anyone want to bet against that happening exactly that way?
If they aren’t voting blue, they’re doing fuckall.
Is there ELI5 for us Europeans?
Members of parliament are vacating their seat because they are not satisfied with what their party is doing? That would be seen as rather undemocratic over here. You would expect them to leave the party, maybe join a different one, or stay as an unaffilated member.
What will happen with the empty seats?
- So in 2015 the headquarters of the DNC and the RNC were hacked by two different expert Russian hacking groups,…
  Massive amounts of dirt on everyone in the DNC and RNC was acquired.
  All the DNC (Democrat) dirt was leaked before the 2016 elections. The RNC (Republican) dirt was held back, and has been being used for other purposes since 2016.
  All who do not support the Orange GodKing are being forced out.
  
  So you are saying they are forced to leave parliament because there is Kompromat?
- Sounds like you got it alright. They're resigning because they don't want to be associated with ultra right wing fascists, which opens up their seat for ultra right wing fascists.
  Look, nobody accused Republicans of being intelligent.
  
  Everyone with two brain cells wants to stay away from facists, that part is clear.
  What i don‘t understan is why they are vacating their parliament seat. Wouldn‘t it be better to stay and vote with the democrats?
  Or better found a new conservative party? Considering there are several fed up members.
  Are they only leaving the parliament or also the party?
- You would expect them to leave the party,
  There are effectively only 2 parties in the US: Republican and Democrat. They are so ideologically opposed (far-right vs moderate, mostly) that changing parties is anathema. There are a few other parties, usually called Independent when they win a seat, but those tend to go to politicians in spite of them being of a different party, i.e. following the individual.
  When people vacate seats before a term is up (more commonly a person just states they won't run for reelection), the state either appoints a replacement (senators) or the states hold a special election (representatives).
  
  I was really wondering about that one. Thanks for answering.
  Everyone here seems to be relaxed about tzhte fact that there will be vacant seats. Good to hear it's just part of how the system works.
  Leaving the parliament before the term ends is so uncommon here, I really don't know what would happen.
  
  They aren't that different tho. The range of policy and stances in policy would/could/does fall within one single party in the rest of the world. Let's break it down.
  Foreign policy = same, cept for the Pro-Putin MAGA crowd. So essentially, there's 2 sides. One side pro-"western" nations (EU, US, Can, Aus, NZ, Jap, SK, Iz, UK) the other is Pro-Putin (Rus, NK, etc, etc)
  Economic policy = samesies; both NeoLiberal, both pro-wartime debt spending, both austerity as matter of course, suppressing knowledge of an alternative even existing.
  A happy worker is a productive worker. Shut up and do your job.
  one side pulls hard hard right, the other comes pre-negotiated to guarantee plans will land further right than they've been written. Like clockwork, undoing the gains from the new deal, slowly and steadily to not invoke revolution. Democrats pass more Republican legislation than Republicans do. We have a choice of working class slavery with no taxes on business or the wealthy, or working class slavery, now but with 10% less taxes on the middle class - but with higher gas prices, cuz fuck you. Since communism fell the US has turned its ire inward trying to turn everyone into proletariat. In other words, with only their labor to sell for $. Add in the destruction of small, local business, rigging the stock market against retail/'dumb' money but usurping retirement accounts and investing everyone's pensions into their pyramid scheme, essentially holding everyone, not just those that want change, hostage
  Social policy = the ONLY difference. This manifests not just thru media, but judicially. Both Pro-Police state. Both twist Mass media (and that's 5he only media now) into the 5th government branch, regurgitating the governments propaganda.
  Republicans are varying degrees conservative, pining for years long gone that no one has actually lived thru. The right wants a return to the post war era, minus unions, taxes, and civic investment (the things that allowed the middle class to exist). Democrats are socially conciliatory. Which is seen as spineless. They'll go along with the get along. But they'll never actually spur change, just appease w/e unrest and go right back to fellatiating corporations and police unions.
  Civilians on both sides want change. Both sides can acknowledge that America is broken but one side says it's because of the transgenders and the gays and the other side just says, to song and dance, "hey, we aren't them 👉" to distract from the pointing fingers at consolidated wealth as the problem.
  So it's get in line, act in line, or get benched.
  Fuck America. We're out here starving and we have the choice of a road side carcass or a multivitamin but never actual food.
Any that don't work against MAGA are complicit. Leaving what's left of the Republican party to the MAGAs kills any chance of eventual recovery of the American political system. There are enough knee-jerk single-issue voters that will only vote against Democrats to do severe damage. If these cowards stayed to moderate the extremists, recovery might have been possible, but they will wash the political blood off of their hands, hide, and watch it burn.
this title is unfortunately metaphorical
Don't forget Joe Manchin.
I would also like to opt out of the next election cycle.
- If a Republican wins in 2024, they will ensure that comes to pass for everyone forever.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
This rush of Republicans abandoning the House is tied to former president Trump’s large lead in the GOP presidential primary race.
Every Republican still in the House next year will be forced to run for reelection while possibly supporting a convicted felon at the head the GOP ticket.
The bad behavior continued last week with House Republicans authorizing subpoenas for Biden’s family in an effort to impeach the president.
They are locked into fear of Trump attacking them even though last Tuesday’s election results signaled that voters reject extreme right-wing MAGA Republicanism.
“Daniel Cameron [in Kentucky’s governor’s race] is the millionth Republican candidate to lose because he was endorsed by Trump,” said conservative commentator Ann Coulter.
To repeat, that means any Republican on the ballot in 2024 faces the ugly prospect of being asked to defend Trump for the next three years, while getting nothing done on Capitol Hill.
The original article contains 838 words, the summary contains 147 words. Saved 82%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
When the GOP is being blackmailed into submission by an orange flaming dotard, their only option is to submit or quit.
- And they're quitting too late. They could've stuck to whatever morals they had and stood their ground and possibly lost their seats, but they were content to toe the line and participate in the destruction of their party. Fuck em.
Hey is that Jonah the cloud botherer over his left shoulder there?

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