Required Reading

Only the first?
(AP photo)

Ace on the Boehner resignation and the need to clean House:

The current idea, favored by the same folks who thought that Boehner was such an Indispensable Man are now agitating to put his loyal (???) lieutenant Kevin McCarthy into the position. Kevin McCarthy is, if it’s possible, a worse RINO than Boehner, and was by Boehner’s side as he punished critics and dissidents for daring to represent their constituents’ interests.

Mark Levin just described Kevin McCarthy as “just as bad as Eric Cantor and ten IQ points dumber.”

Under no circumstances should the Freedom Caucus permit McCarthy, Scalise, or Cathy McMorris Rogers — all the Boehner Warriors who have brought GOP morale to all-time lows — to serve in any leadership position. A purge is a purge. To permit any of this crew to profit from their disasters would show the GOP to be what many of us strongly suspect it is — basically, the Teachers Union for RINOs, an organization devoted to protecting its members jobs and not to serving its alleged constituents.

4. And on that point, note that if McCarthy, Scalise, and McMorris Rogers merely advance one step each in the leadership, then the only person to have paid any price here is Boehner; the rest of them will actually benefit from the Freedom Caucus forcing them out.

They should not benefit. We keep saying, of Obama, that failure ought to have consequences; how can this team be characterized as anything other than complete failures?

Are we rewarding Republican failures while claiming Obama should be held accountable for his own?

How does that work?

Read the whole thing — it’s required.

I’d add that perhaps Boehner didn’t deserve quite all the kicking around he’s gotten, but that his leadership certainly doesn’t fit the current mood of the grassroots GOP. The grassroots wants blood, and Boehner’s was as good a place to start the bloodletting as any, although perhaps only because his was most readily available.

This bloodlust also explains Donald Trumps “He fights!” appeal. He might be little more than an overaged and under-informed Mean Girl with bad hair and a worse tan, but he has drawn blood, or at least the appearance of having drawn blood, from the unloved and untrusted GOP establishment.

Over on the Senate side however, Mitch McConnell richly deserves everything he’s gotten and more, and it can only be hoped that his is the next scalp collected by the grassroots.