The Once and Future GOP House III

How John Boehner lost to chaos

Before becoming Speaker, Newt Gingrich was merely the House Minority Whip. Dennis Hastert was Chief Deputy Whip. Paul Ryan was Chair of Ways and Means and Budget.

Only John Boehner took the more conventional approach of actually climbing the political ladder - he served as majority leader for nearly a year (the last 11 months of Haster’s speakership), and when the Democrats retook House after the 2006 midterms - Boehner was Minority Leader for 4 years.

His Speakership lasted slightly longer - 4 years and 297 days. His tenure was the 13th longest — ahead of Gingrich and Ryan, but well behind Hastert and Pelosi. It’s safe to say, however, that Boehner is in the top 5 Speakers who did not enjoy the job very much. In his political memoir, “On the House” Boehner assessed his time as Speaker thusly:

“Under the new rules of Crazytown, I may have been Speaker, but I didn't hold all the power. By 2013 the chaos caucus in the House had built up their own power base thanks to fawning right-wing media and outrage-driven fundraising cash. And now they had a new head lunatic leading the way, who wasn't even a House member. There is nothing more dangerous than a reckless a**hole who thinks he is smarter than everyone else. Ladies and gentleman, meet Senator Ted Cruz.”

The reason for that particular snipe was because the federal goverment was facing a shutdown over rasing the debt ceiling — a legislative process the GOP has no issues with as long as they control the White House. And yes, Ted Cruz deserved much of the blame for that particular fiasco.

It would be nice to say that John Boehner had opposed the “chaos caucus” from the get go, but the facts are that Boehner and the rest of the GOP leadership welcomed the Tea Party acolytes with open arms.

Why? Simple, the Tea Party movement was composed of disaffected and disillusioned voters and most of them were Democrats. In the Tea Party, the GOP saw base expansion and burgeoning conservative populism.

The liberal and progressive wings of the Democratic Party was not sorry to see them go, and party moderates didn’t have any good arguments to give the political Left pause. Who wants a bunch of grumpy conservatives in your party who were infrequent voters at best?

If Kevin McCarthy becomes Speaker, the chaos caucus will have one of its own — someone who rejects seniority, institutional norms, or ideological principles. Any attempt by McCarthy to instill party discipline or to push them towards responsible governance will likey be met with Boehner’s fate.

Or you can ask Paul Ryan.