Upside Down

all of our institutional dysfunction encapsulated in just four minutes

There are many things to say about the Kevin McCarthy vote, and I’m not going to say most of them, because some things are too obvious for commentary. But this needs to be said.

You’re standing next to a stranger on the sidewalk when a person rides by on a bicycle. The person on the bike is pushing the pedals, which transfers energy through a chain to the wheels, making the bike roll down the street. Suddenly, though, the person next to you starts screaming in horror: “That bike is broken! Something has gone horribly wrong!” You try to figure out what he means, but all he can tell you is that the person on the bike is pushing the pedals, and the wheels are turning, and the bike is rolling down the street. “It’s an ABSOLUTELY UNSPEAKABLE DISASTER,” the stranger tells you, as he foams at the mouth and his eyes roll back in his head.

Now, watch this appalling speech from the floor of the House of Representatives, which took place on Friday night between votes for the position of Speaker of the House:

Rep. Dean Phillips 🇺🇸 @RepDeanPhillips

Wow.

The House of Representatives is a deliberative body; it arrives at decisions through debate and negotiation. It exists to argue, gathering people from different places who have different values to make shared decisions through a deliberative process. The Speaker of the House has power; the question of who should serve in that role merits considerable debate. But, pardon my language but it’s well justified, look what this absolutely enormous asshole says about the repeated votes and extended process involved in selecting a Speaker: “And happiness? Suffice to say, Americans are unhappy by the nonsense and the dysfunction playing out on this floor.” And then he presents, as a positive bit of contrast, “the 212 unified members of the House Democratic caucus,” who have “a very effective solution for this problem: We call him Hakeem Jeffries.”

So when members of a portion of a deliberative body are unified behind the authority of a single personality, that portion of the deliberative body is working. But when members of a deliberative body engage in debate and negotiation over contested votes, that deliberative body is dysfunctional.

Boil that down:

A member of the House of Representatives has just argued that deliberation is a sign of dysfunction in a deliberative body. That’s how sick and broken this institution has become.

Worse, he presents complete unity as a positive in a legislative caucus. Quick: If I show you a legislature that votes with complete unity, what kind of society am I showing you?

Members of the House like Lauren Boebert and Matt Gaetz withheld their votes from Kevin McCarthy for the purpose of engaging in negotiations to advance their legislative agenda. Maybe they negotiated wisely and maybe they didn’t, and maybe I agree with them or maybe I don’t, but that’s the job. Debate and contested votes aren’t a sign of failure in a representative democracy — that is, in the deliberative institutions of a republic. They’re the thing itself, the necessary and appropriate process of policymaking through the process of debate.

Over and over and over again, the proper functioning of American institutions is presented to us as a disaster. People are refusing to take experimental vaccines without informed consent — ohhhhh, what’s gone WRONG!?!?!?

Or: The House of Representatives is engaged in debate instead of unity, which is dysfunctional. “Gentlemen, you can’t debate in here — this is the House of Representatives!”

Contested votes and sustained legislative negotiation are the opposite of dysfunction. They’re the thing working as designed, working properly, and we’re living through a daily comic opera of pathetic gaslighting by soulless amoral hucksters. Don’t ever fall for any of it.