The House of Representatives adjourned for the day without electing Rep. Kevin McCarthy as Speaker, while new Congressman George Santos has told so many lies that he shouldn’t be sworn into office.I haven't used the Pickled Tongue label for McCarthy since July 2022, but it looks like it's going to get a workout now that he's contending for Speaker of the House, however long that takes. If he wins, I'll be using it more. If he fails, well, so long and good riddance, although the successor could likely be worse. As I usually write about population, "Be careful what you wish for, you might get it."
As for why the far right of the GOP is opposed to McCarthy, it's because he's just to the left of the Congressional Party's center, as shown in this image from VoteView.
The labeled red triangle shows Kevin McCarthy's location in ideological space according to Voteview, which lists his ideological score as 0.454, more liberal than 59% of Republicans in the 117th House. In contrast, his Republican rival for Speaker, Jim Jordan, has an ideological score of 0.717, which Voteview describes as more conservative than 92% of Republicans in the 117th House and more conservative than 96% of U.S. Representatives. The orange triangle below locates his position in ideological space.
I doubt he'll be elected Speaker, either, but if he is, he would be much worse than McCarthy. For starters, listening to him and reading his words makes me feel stupid, so I have him muted on Twitter. At least he's genuine in his awfulness. George Santos, as Stephen points out, is a complete phony who is unfit for office. Worse yet, he's a fugitive from justice in Brazil. Maybe he and Lauren Boebert should compare rap sheets.
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