[Watching the GOP’s circular firing squad during the speaker
votes was entertaining, but what do progressive Democrats have to show
for rallying round their party’s leadership?]
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THE LEFT WAS MISSING IN ACTION FROM THE MCCARTHY SPECTACLE  
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D.D. Guttenplan for The Nation
January 20, 2023
The Nation
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_ Watching the GOP’s circular firing squad during the speaker votes
was entertaining, but what do progressive Democrats have to show for
rallying round their party’s leadership? _

, Mangel Ngan / Getty

 

If you rely on the corporate media, the 15 ballots it took to elect
Kevin McCarthy as speaker of the House might seem like a triumph for
the Democratic Party, whose “quiet competence and unity,” NBC
declared
[[link removed]],
“is a stark contrast not just to GOP fecklessness” but also to the
usual media storyline of “Dems in disarray.” For once, Bloomberg
[[link removed]] approvingly,
Democrats flexed their “unity muscles.”
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Isn’t it pretty to think so? But while it’s true that Democrats
stuck together to deliver 15 unanimous tallies for their candidate,
minority leader Hakeem Jeffries, what have they got to show for it?
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In exchange for his supposed public humiliation, Kevin McCarthy—a
politician of no discernible principles beyond personal
advancement—now sits second in line to the presidency. (Note to
Biden: No more joint appearances with Kamala Harris.) True, his hold
on the job may be somewhat tenuous, though former speaker John Boehner
managed to do a lot of damage despite being similarly encumbered. More
significantly, Republicans can now credibly force McCarthy to insist
on 
[[link removed]]cuts
to Social Security and Medicare
[[link removed]] as
part of any grand bargain on the budget (a degree of coercion akin to
forcing Homer Simpson to swallow another doughnut). Meanwhile, Matt
Gaetz and his insurrectionist co-conspirators have gained three seats
on the House Rules Committee
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instituted new rules
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that while spending increases must be offset by cuts, proposals to
raise taxes will now require a three-fifths supermajority.

In the past, playing an inside game arguably made sense for
progressives, who by (quietly) threatening to withhold their votes
from Nancy Pelosi won key committee assignments, hearings on Medicare
for All, and a seat at the budget table for caucus chair Pramila
Jayapal—plus the biggest infrastructure bill
[[link removed]] in
decades, the largest climate change bill ever
[[link removed].],
and, with the CHIPS Act, the beginnings of an industrial policy
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Now all they have is a lot of love on social media for Hakeem
Jeffries’s alphabetical oratory… and not much else.

Let us consider the disposition of forces after this recent
ideological skirmish. On the far right: McCarthy, Steve Scalise,
Richard Hudson, Gary Palmer, Elise Stefanik—all of whom voted
against
[[link removed]] certifying
the 2020 presidential election results and now hold leadership
positions
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On the far, far right: Gaetz and his fellow holdouts (outside the
tent, but by no means far from the levers of power)—but also Jim
Jordan and Marjorie Taylor Greene (now very much inside the tent). In
the center, the Democrats led by Jeffries, who told _The Atlantic_
[[link removed]],
“There will never be a moment where I bend the knee to hard-left
democratic socialism.” And the left? Missing in action.

No wonder the whole spectacle left Kshama Sawant fighting mad
[[link removed]]:
Congressional progressives failed to stand up to the party
establishment or, as she put it, “win ANY gains for working
people.” The Seattle councilwoman isn’t the only one.
Watching Ted Cruz
[[link removed]] and Josh
Hawley
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with Bernie Sanders over paid sick leave for rail workers—a measure
that somehow failed to unify Senate Democrats or win the backing
of the “most pro-union president”
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his transportation secretary
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just the latest in a series of infuriating progressive fumbles. Back
when Democrats had a majority in the House, the party still couldn’t
secure student debt relief, voting rights, a federal guarantee for
abortion rights, a public option
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health care, or any federal response to the crisis in affordable
housing or to Republican attacks on public education. “Organization
not based on principle is meaningless,” observed Lenin, whose
Republican disciples have just demonstrated that being in the
minority—or even a minority of the minority—is no excuse for
failure.

One small first step for progressives would be to demand party unity
in defense of Ilhan Omar
[[link removed]] and
other Democrats whom McCarthy has threatened to remove from House
committees. Another would be to prohibit the DCCC, special interests
like AIPAC
[[link removed]],
and outside dark money groups from interfering in Democratic primary
races to derail progressive challengers.

Still, if congressional progressives want to be taken seriously as
anything more than a cheering section, they’ll have to get organized
enough to stop serving as a centrist doormat—and be willing to show
much more principled defiance of the party leadership
[[link removed]].
Which might mean putting down the lyric sheet to “Kumbaya” and
brushing up their Lenin.

_Copyright c 2023 The Nation. Reprinted with permission. May not be
reprinted without permission
[[link removed]].
Distributed by PARS International Corp
[[link removed]]._

_Please support  progressive journalism. Get a digital subscription
[[link removed]]
to The Nation for just $24.95!    _

_D.D. GUTTENPLAN is editor of The Nation. His books include American
Radical: The Life and Times of I.F. Stone, The Nation: A Biography
[[link removed]] and The
Next Republic: The Rise of a New Radical Majority._

_THE NATION [[link removed]] Founded by abolitionists in
1865, The Nation has chronicled the breadth and depth of political
and cultural life, from the debut of the telegraph to the rise of
Twitter, serving as a critical, independent, and progressive voice in
American journalism._

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