Now that John Boehner has been successfully reelected Speaker , the details are now coming out about that band of whacky teabaggers who voted against him and tried to deny him victory on the first ballot. And it is shaping up to be quite a hilarious spectacle, because the coup seems far less along the lines of Brutus stabbing Caeser in the back and more along the lines of a Three Stooges caper. Except I don't think the Stooges were ever this bumbling.
First, a little historical context. You may remember back in 1997, there was a serious attempt to force Newt Gingrich's resignation as Speaker, a plan that seemed to have great chance of success until Dick Armey, upset that his fellow plotters wouldn't support him as Gringrich's replacement, ran and tattled to Newt, strangling the coup in its cradle and blowing up in the conspirators' faces (especially Gingrich's protege Bill Paxon of New York, whose promising House career never recovered from his betrayal of Newt). Why am I bringing this up? Because (a) that was a well-organized coup attempt that only failed because on the plotters deliberately blew it up and (b) irony reasons, since the Drunk Weepy Oompa-Loompa was apparently one of the plotters.
Now flash-foward to this January and the plot against Boner. And compared to the 1997 plot, this one is a absolute farce. Joshua Green at BusinessWeek has a particuarly enlightening and hilarious recap of how the coup attempt went down and the whole affair is just a list of bungling and incompetence. Especially hilarious is how the coup was conceived in the first place:
Next step: Plotting. This one didn't go too well either. On Wednesday night, an amused Republican staffer called me to report that Representatives Jim Jordan, Paul Gosar, Raul Labrador, and Steve Southerland were gathered at Bullfeathers, a Capitol Hill bar, openly plotting their coup. Not exactly the Roman Senate scheming to dispatch Caeser.
Think this coup was the result of long-term, intricate planning? Nope, it was hatched at the end of a drunken Wednesday night bull-session at the local watering hole. Who knew House conservative strategy meetings take their cue from fratboys?
But once they got the coup "planned," they knew to be discreet about it, right? After all, the 1997 coup only collapsed because Armey tipped off Gingrich, so they learned their lesson about keeping things on the down low, right? Dead wrong.
Rep. Tim Huelskamp (R-KS) - who was recently removed from key committees and support Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) for speaker - sat on the House floor during the speaker vote brandishing an iPad. A message was displayed on the screeen ticking off members of the House Republican Conference he hoped would oppose the sitting speaker. The title of the document, "You would be fired if this goes out."
But if a
Politico photographer snaps pictures of it over your shoulder, everything's cool, right?
And another thing the plotters didn't do; actually make sure their so-called fellow conspirators actually knew they were in on the attempt:
Among the Republicans on the list were Reps. Steve King (Iowa) Cynthia Lummis (Wyo.), Paul Gosar (Ariz.), Scott Garrett (N.J.), Steve Fincher (Tenn.) and Scott Desjarlais (Tenn.). All of them ultimately supported Boehner.
It's not clear that any of the Republicans on Huelskamp's list knew they were on it, or even knew of the list's existence.
I'm guessing no. Especially after
this ancedote, courtesy of the
The Hill.
Rep. Trent Franks (R-Ariz.) told reporters that a member - whom he would not name - came up to him on the House floor about 15 minutes before the vote and said "there might be some effort to dissent."
"I said that's exactly what the Democrats would like to see us do," Franks said he told the member.
Aided by a reporter if the effort to deposed Boehner was "chaotic and disorganized," Franks relied: "I think that's being charitable."
15 minutes?! I don't think Brutus went up to Cassius and said "Yo, dude, I'm turning Julius into a corpse in 15. You in?"
More from Franks, courtesy of Robert Costa of the National Review, highlighting that whole last minute "you want to join our coup?" strategy:
Several other members who were approached, he says, did the same. "I'm one of the most conservative guys here and I find out about this thing 15 minutes before the vote?" Franks asks, in an interview at the Capitol. "To me, it was a ridiculous miscalculation by a sincere but inept group."
That's being too kind. (Feel free to read Costa's entire piece, at it's an enlightening look at the disarry inside the House GOP and inside the failed plot, including the info that Huelskamp's fellow teabagger and Boner atagonist Justin Amash of MI was the one "quarterbacking" the plot.)
And further highlighting the potters' ineptness; they had no one in place to replace the Drunk Weepy Oompa-Loompa should they actually succeed. Back to Joshua Green again:
First step: Finding an alternative. As my editors would happily tell them, it's a lousy job. Eric Cantor didn't want it. Paul Ryan didn't want it. But they decided not to let this detail slow them down.
Both of those alternatives, by the way, voted for Boner (as did Jim Jordan, Huelskamp's eventual choice, and Tom Price of GA, who had been floated earlier as a possible challenger to Boner). Indeed, Cantor seemed
visibly disgusted with the whole thing:
Cantor himself voted for Boehner and shook his head with displeasure when he was nominated. The rest of the leadership team sat beside him projecting the same irritation throughout the roll call, and beforehand. Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy of California could be seen having heated conversations with a few members.
"There's just some releationship issues," said Republican Policy Committee Chairman James Lankford of Oklahoma, who said he will go to work trying to reach out to the disaffcted members.
Translation: there's going to be hell to pay. And after their utter incompetence, these clowns deserve it.
Oh well. These bumbling, incompetent plotters should have taken a lesson from Omar Little.