Entropy is largely seen as not a good thing for a civilization, but I'm not entirely sure that's true. It does have its uses, especially in a free society. It all boils down to how you restore order once chaos sets in.
Republicans are definitely in a state of chaos. With Kevin McCarthy ousted as Speaker of the House at the hands of a small group of Republicans and all the Democrats, the Republican Party is looking like it doesn't have it together and they're ripping apart at the seams. As I write this, there's a lot of rending of garments and gnashing of teeth going on...but there's also a ton of celebration.
McCarthy wasn't popular from the get-go. Many voters either flat-out didn't want him or they considered him the figure to merely settle on. I don't know many people who particularly thought he was the best man for the job. I would say that the coup didn't surprise me, but it did because it was the first display of cojones I've seen from the Republican Party in months.
In fact, this was inevitable, not because there was a solid chunk of the GOP that didn't like McCarthy, but because this is the nature of the Republican Party. It is a party of individualists. Mix that with the fact that politics is cut-throat and you're going to get some real Machiavellian moments like the one we saw on Tuesday.
Even as I write this, I see people like Stephen Miller on Fox News proclaiming that we need to be more like Democrats and get in lock-step with one another.
Sorry, that's just not going to happen. This is not the kind of party where everyone from its members to its voters just shrugs off their own concerns and needs and follows along with whatever its leadership says it should in order to empower the party even more. Sure, if Republicans did do that then Democrats would probably never win a national election ever again save for a few blue islands, but then it would no longer be the Republican Party. The powerful would just want more power and they'd have the means to take it with them thinking and doing whatever they say.
It would just be another Democrat Party.
The Republican Party maintains its integrity, at least at its foundations, because voters are willing to hold their own accountable. That accountability creates some real warriors for freedom, and it's those people who keep this country alive while so many forces are trying so hard to suffocate it under a totalitarian boot.
As I have said many times before this, freedom and chaos are cousins. The Republican Party advocates for chaos in various ways all the time but with guidelines of law and order to keep entropy in check. It is the party of controlled chaos. As such, chaos is inevitable within the party and things like this will happen when the conditions are ripe.
The moment that McCarthy's name was floated as Speaker, the conditions became very ripe. All someone had to do was pick the fruit. Whether you liked it or not, the likelihood of this happening was always high.
But as my colleague Bonchie wrote, as much as many people are angry about this, it's done. The question is, what now?:
With that said, what's done is done, and now Republicans have to come up with a plan to somehow turn this into a win. That's not going to be an easy task, and I'm not seeing much evidence that there's any attempt to do so.
The House is in disarray and chaos abounds, but instead of getting mad about it, Republicans should do what they do naturally. They should embrace the chaos and see where they can implement a little order here and a little order there.
McCarthy was largely disliked by his own party's voters because he behaved in a very Democrat-lite manner. As the Republican voters of America have routinely demonstrated, this is only going to cause a backlash and a revolt. We should begin asking ourselves questions about who is capable of wrangling Democrats, not caving to them. Who is good at utilizing chaos? Who has teeth and is willing to use them in order to give the people confidence in the Republican brand of order?
I don't expect you all to come to the same conclusion. I don't even expect you all to agree with my take.
That's just part of being a party of individualists.