Mark levin twitter site1/23/2024 ![]() ![]() As of this evening, two names have emerged: House Majority Leader Steve Scalise and Representative Jim Jordan of Ohio. So what happens now? Some floated the idea of McCarthy merely running for the job again, but he assured reporters that won’t happen. As the Atlantic contributor Peter Wehner wrote, McCarthy is “a cautionary tale of what happens when people with soaring ambitions and no principles gain political power-and what they will do to keep that power.” ![]() After debasing himself to get the speaker job in the first place (remember those 15 rounds of votes?) and launching an impeachment inquiry against President Joe Biden, McCarthy proved his own main-character bona fides, making clear that he was someone who would do anything for approval. The goal is to never be it.” The new speaker, whenever they are elected, will likely face the same struggles that doomed McCarthy. In a recent episode of Washington Week With The Atlantic, our editor in chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, asked, “Why would anyone want to be the speaker of the House?” noting that the job sounds like “pure misery.” In some ways, the profoundly unappealing nature of the speaker gig calls to mind a timeless piece of internet wisdom: “Each day on twitter there is one main character. Gaetz, Capitol Hill’s definitive new main character, got the headlines he craved. ![]() The vote passed because Gaetz and seven members of the GOP gambled, hoping they’d have enough Democrats to put them over the edge. During yesterday’s proceeding, 210 Republicans opposed Gaetz’s motion. The irony is that Gaetz’s motion to vacate the chair succeeded only because of strong Democratic support. Rather, he was seemingly punishing the speaker for what my colleague Ronald Brownstein called “the one sin that cannot be forgiven in the modern Republican Party”-working with Democrats. Gaetz appeared to be seeking the spotlight-though, notably, not setting himself up to take McCarthy’s job. Gaetz’s successful demolition of Speaker Kevin McCarthy was part of his larger demolition of the House of Representatives, which itself was part of … what, exactly? Why did this whole mess actually happen? Florida Representative Matt Gaetz is clearly the main character this week. Main-character syndrome (also referred to as “main-character energy”) has spilled over into scores of congressional proceedings. Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene doing well, anything? Main character. Representative Lauren Boebert recently flouting theater norms (understatement of the year) during a Beetlejuice performance? Main character. Politics has long been full of these kinds of main characters, but the Trump era brought them into the mainstream. In 2023, a main character is often clueless and narcissistic, someone who views the world around them as a backdrop while they waltz through life. Or those TikTok “day in the life” videos, where something as simple as traveling to a sales conference and hitting the hotel breakfast bar is portrayed with the cinematic gravitas of the restaurant scene in Goodfellas. Consider the people who snap flirty selfies at somber locations such as Auschwitz. Main-character syndrome, the defining personality trait of our time, is not a compliment. In recent years, this concept has been inverted. Most of us grew up with the phrase main character as a synonym for a story’s protagonist-the person we root for.
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