Everything Is Fine*

*In reality, everything is not fine.

I’m Michael A. Cohen, and this is Truth and Consequences: A no-holds-barred look at the absurdities, hypocrisies, and surreality. If you were sent this email or are a free subscriber and would like to become a paid subscriber, you can sign up here.

Quick housekeeping note: a few folks complained this week that the pieces I include in my What’s Going On section are behind paywalls. This is a perennial problem, and I don’t have a good solution. I try to pick pieces that are not behind paywalls, but sometimes, it’s simply not possible. Since I rely on a firewall for this newsletter, I can’t be in the position of helping people pierce other ones. However, if you send me a note offline, I will try to send you the article as a gift (as some sites do allow that).

Also, remember a few weeks ago when I said that Wisconsin Republicans would likely not impeach Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Janet Protasiewicz. Well, guess what …

Wisconsin Republicans signaled on Thursday that they were retreating from their threats to impeach a recently seated liberal State Supreme Court justice, Janet Protasiewicz, before the newly left-leaning court could throw out the gerrymandered legislative maps that have cemented the G.O.P.’s hold on power in the state.

(Don’t forget to click the button).

Welcome To The Shit Show

Today, House Republicans will attempt to select a new Speaker of the House, and it’s likely to go as well as the last time they went down this road in January. The caucus’s nominee is Jim Jordan, who (and I’m using these words carefully) is a malignant clown. Jordan not only is an election denier, a hard-core Republican extremist, and a “legislative terrorist,” according to former Speaker John Boehner, but he actively assisted Donald Trump’s effort to overturn the 2020 election.

As a member of Congress, he has one of the body’s thinnest legislative records. In 16 years, he’s never passed a single piece of legislation. According to the Center for Effective Lawmaking, Jordan is one of the singularly most ineffective members of Congress.

• Last Congress, only four lawmakers ranked below him.

• He has ranked in the bottom five among House Republicans each of the past four Congresses.

• He has ranked in the bottom quarter of House Republicans in every full Congress he served in.

• Before this Congress, its data don’t record any bills Jordan sponsored passing or receiving any action — whether in committee or on the floor.

That’s a terrible record, and it’s a reminder that Jordan’s key priority in Congress is not passing laws or helping the American people but acting as a political troll. This is a guy who has made his bones by lodging partisan, dishonest, culture war attacks against Democrats, making a spectacle of himself in committee meetings, slavishly defending Trump, and offering no quarter and no outstretched hand to Democrats.

Yet, the irony is that Jordan’s paltry legislative record and his slashing partisan politics make him the perfect person to helm the House GOP caucus. Like Jordan, congressional Republicans have no interest in governing the country, little interest in passing meaningful legislation, and lots of interest in fighting partisan and culture war fights with Democrats.

To be sure, there’s no guarantee that Jordan will get the speakership. I’m writing this in the midst of the first vote in the House, and Jordan doesn’t have the votes to win. Could that change on a second or third ballot? Possibly, but for now, it’s been approximately 1 1/4 Scaramuccis since the House had a Speaker.

UPDATE: Just as I’m about to publish, the results are in and 20 Republicans refused to vote for Jordan. That’s a large number (12 more than voted against McCarthy two weeks ago), and I’d be surprised if he can overcome that level of opposition.

One More Thing …

Photo by Mitchell Luo on Unsplash

The other thing to remember about Jordan becoming Speaker is that if it happens, you might as well hand over the speakership gavel to Hakeem Jeffries in 2025.

I wrote about this last week in my latest MSNBC column, but the electoral math for House Republicans is terrible. Democrats will likely pick up 2-4 House seats in the South because of a Supreme Court ruling requiring Alabama to create a second majority-black district. Redistricting could cost Democrats a few seats in North Carolina, but they should more than make up for that if a new map is drawn in New York. Republicans have a narrow 5-seat majority in the House, but when you factor in these changes, it will arguably be a tie ballgame at the starting line. If Republicans in districts won by Joe Biden have to run with Jordan as their leader, the math gets even harder. Jordan is a toxic political figure who will be featured in every House Democratic campaign ad against vulnerable Republicans.

So, while I’m not saying Jeffries can start measuring the drapes in the Speaker’s office, I wouldn’t fault him for picking out a few fabric swatches.

Biden On The Move

The White House announced today that President Bill will travel to Israel this week and then visit “Jordan to hold talks on the conflict with King Abdullah II, President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi of Egypt and President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority.”