On John Boehner Stepping Down as Speaker of the House

Speaker John Boehner's press conference announcing his now pending resignation as Speaker at the end of October was a surreal mixture of cheeriness, candor and subterfuge.  

It was odd to have a politician who is third in line to succeed the President sing "Zip-a-Dee-Do-Dah" from Disney's Song of the South (1946) at a somber moment as he contemplates his post-speakership future.  This may to be project a sunny confidence to himself and the public. Yet it is not the first time that Mr. Boehner has sung Zip-a-Dee-Do-Dah in the face of hard questions.  Perhaps he likes to see Mr. Bluebird on his shoulder. 

Speaker Boehner showed some candor when speaking about stepping down from the Speakership.  Mr. Boehner revealed that he intended to do so at the end of the 113th Congress, but events during the summer of 2014 changed plans.  What that meant was that Speaker Boehner's hand picked successor to the Speaker's gavel, then Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA 7th)  lost a primary challenge to a small college economist professor now Congressman David Brat (R-VA 7th).  Seeing the House in turmoil, Speaker Boehner decided to continue on in the big chair.

Yet it strains credulity that Mr. Boeher's decision was spur of the moment.  During the parade of cable coverage of Pope Francis' visit to Washington, a political commentator opined that the culmination Mr.  Boehner's  tenure as Speaker was to greet the Pope in the Capitol so why not just drop the mike afterwards and proclaim "I'm outta' here".  Was it prescience or planted pontification by the pundit?

How convenient that the day after the Pope's visit to DC on a dead news day in Washington that Mr. Boehner just decides "I'm gonna' do it."  Sure. 

Speaker Boehner's remarks on resigning glossed over the real reason why he was vacating his chair. Mainly because he no longer had the votes within the Republican Caucus to retain power if Representative Mark Meadows (R-NC 11th) actually filed the Motion to Vacate the Chair, which is a privileged motion for the full House to vote on leadership.  It became crystal clear to Mr. Boehner that he did not have the votes to win by a party line vote.

Republican Establishment politicians in the House loyal to Speaker Boehner, like Representative Devin Nunes (R-CA 22nd) began to attack  to the Freedom Caucus as "Pelosi Republicans", which was an odd turn of phrase, as Boehner would have needed to rely upon the graces of Democrat Minority Leader to engineer a victory for Speaker Boehner (by having some members vote for retaining Boehner as Speaker or merely vote present). 

One suspects that Mr. Boehner is being coy about his future plans.  Maybe he does not want to give out his forwarding address to K Street at the present time. By stepping down instead of being voted out, his name may have more Marquis cache after the one year  cooling off period to comply with the 2007 Lobbying Law ends.

Senator Marco Rubio at 2015 Value Voters Summit 

Whether or not Speaker Boehner's resignation was planned or was spontaneous, this is no argument how it was received by conservatives.  At the Value Voters Summit, which featured a cattle call of Republican Presidential aspirants, the one line which drew the loudest and most sustained applause was when Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) announced from the dais the news that Speaker Boehner was leaving office.  The next scheduled speaker at the Values Voters Summit had to cancel, as Congressman Mark Meadows was a little busy after that news.

Vacant Musings About Capitol Hill

Second term Congressman Mark Meadows (R-NC 11th) submitted a Motion to Declare the Speaker’s Chair vacant in July. This is not something which has been used in Congress in the last century. So initially, this seemed like a futile gesture of frustration filed by a disgruntled back bencher just before the Summer Break.  The Republican establishment thought that the motion would lose momentum by going through the standard committee process. But there are now reports that Speaker Boehner is worried that he is short of votes in the Republican caucus to be re-elected as Speaker.

At the start of the 114th Congress, Speaker Boehner faced a revolt from two dozen Tea Party types who voted for other GOP candidates.  Boehner barely won by two votes and was aided by the fact that many New York Democrats were absent for the vote to attend the funeral for Governor Mario Cuomo (D-NY).  This exigency lowered the threshold for achieving a majority.

Some have speculated that insurgent Republican Congressmen could put up a liberal Republican candidate, like Rep. Peter King (R-NY 2nd), to win enough Democrat votes to take down the current king of the Hill.  This notion is mistaken because it presumes that Democrats would want to replace Speaker Boehner and does not fully understand the process.

In fact, there is some speculation that John Boehner might have to rely upon Democrat votes to retain the Speaker’s chair. Arguably, House Democrats may prefer to have  Boehner as Speaker if they are not going to be in the majority.  However, having Democrats prop up a wounded Republican Speaker would reflect poorly upon the cosiness of the Washington political establishment and the effectiveness of the leadership.

But there might be a passive way which the Democrat caucus could prop up their favored establishment opposition.  In the event that the Motion to Declare the Chair Vacant succeeds, Democrats could conveniently have a few dozen Democrats miss the vote, thereby lowering the total vote count, thereby countering the thirty GOP insurgents and re-electing Speaker Boehner.
 The trick would be to accurately estimate the number of dissenting GOP votes.  A similar outcome could also be achieved the helpful opposition voted “Present”, however, that would leave Democrat fingerprints on the vote.

If no candidate garners the necessary 218 votes (or a majority of those voting), then there would be subsequent votes.  But like the scenario of a brokered political convention, all bets are off after the initial round. If Mr. Boehner could not achieve a majority in the first vote, power would ebb away.  Without having the power of the Speaker’s chair and the ability to appoint chairmen and exile dissenters from committees, he would lose the fealty of the current leadership.  In fact, current Majority Leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA 23rd) and current House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-LA 1st) might not be in contention for not mooting the revolt beforehand.

With the Iran Deal, legislation to defund Planned Parenthood and passing the Budget on the docket this fall, a leadership battle could make this a very interesting time on Capitol Hill.  But observing the machinations of the Senate's Corker/Cardin Iran Deal vote, don't discount the establishment's ability to choreograph "victories which seem inimical to the vox populi but keeps their Cocktail Party plans. 

Latest Hillary E-Mail Dump Offers Incisive Oppo Analysis

The latest batch of Hillary Clinton's sanitized State Department e-mails offered some incisive analysis of the opposition by Clinton's "unofficial" advisor Sidney Blumenthal.   

Blumenthal's sharp criticisms from 2011 of the newly elected Speaker of the House John Boehner seem to reflect the initial animus against elites which the wave of Tea Party candidates harbored for a do nothing Congress.

However, the Clinton confidant goes much further than the public grousing against the putative head of the GOP-e Cocktail Party. The ad hominem attacks gut Speaker Boehner's leadership and loyalty.

Where "Sid Vicious"'s assessment seems awry is being "Delay without the whip".  Despite misgivings by many in the Republican Caucus, Boehner and the current leadership team have managed to retain their positions.

 John Boehner was be re-elected for another term as House Speaker in January 2015, despite a couple of last minute challenges by Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX 1st), Rep. Daniel Webster (R-FL 10th) et ali.  Boehner won re-election by two votes. This coup within the GOP caucus may have been thwarted because there were a number of missing New York Democrats who were attending former Governor Mario Cuomo's (D-NY) funeral the day of the vote, which lowered the threshold for  having a majority.

Dissatisfaction has not been abated from Tea Party types in the House Republican caucus. In July 2015, Representative Mark Meadows (R-NC 11th) introduced a Resolution to Declare the Office of Speaker of the House vacant.  Since this was not a privileged motion, the resolution needs to go through the regular committee process, in which it will likely be quashed by Republican Boehner supporters.

For his part, Speaker Boehner does not quietly suffer indignation from insurgents.  Recently, during a political fundraiser in Colorado, John Boehner noted that a leading Tea Party figure, Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) has been on the Presidential primary hustings which he said keeps that "jackass" out of Washington. So much for Reagan's 11th commandment.

The hallmark of the 2016 Republican Presidential primary campaign has been outsiders who are rally around the perception that Washington doesn't work with the current ineffectual leadership.  One wonders how an anti-establishment wave would work with the accomodationist leadership of Speaker John Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY).  Could Boehner co-opt incoming Freshmen again or would their anger at the system and earnestness effectuate real change in the District of Calamity (sic)?