The power of performative politics

Also: Finally, Madame Governor [View in browser](    [❤️]( January 8, 2023 Dear Cog reader, It didn’t take very long for 2023 to deliver big news. After the long holiday break, I feel like I’ve been shot out of a cannon (or [run overÂ]( one of those toy kiddie electric cars). This week, I couldn’t tear myself away from Kevin McCarthy’s protracted battle for speaker of the House. He won late Friday night, after 15 consecutive votes — the longest stretch of speaker votes without resolution since 1859. There is no shortage of commentary on this political debacle. But I urge you to read ours, by the great Eileen McNamara. Eileen wrote a [blistering column]( the draws a straight line between the 20 or so GOP agitators of today (including the likes of Trump acolytes Lauren Boebert, Matt Gaetz and Marjorie Taylor Greene) to Newt Gingrich, who, she writes, “was among the first to recognize the power of performative politics.” She reminds readers of a notorious scene in 1984, involving a very young Rep. Gingrich, who led his young colleagues — referred to as the “right wing guerrillas” — in a series of televised stunts denouncing then-Speaker Thomas P. O’Neill, Jr. and other Democratic leaders. The young Republicans were angry about the Speaker’s refusal to schedule debate on proposed constitutional amendments that then dominated the conservative agenda. Eileen covered Gingrich and his comrades (eventually referred to as “The Three Stooges” by Speaker O’Neill) for the Boston Globe in the 1980s. She very kindly sent me a few of her own clips from that era to read through. From her piece on May 16, 1984: "Congressional nerves, in the metaphor employed by majority leader Jim Wright of Texas, were wound tighter than 'a cotton clothesline after a rain.' " And her piece on June 5, 1984: "In the ensuing skirmishes on and off the floor, Republicans accused Democrats of McCarthyism; Democrats called Republicans cry babies; Michel called O'Neill dictatorial; O'Neill called his leading GOP critics the Three Stooges and, after one shouting match, was ruled out of order for violating House decorum." Reading these pieces from nearly 40 years ago is a reminder that as outrageous as the events in Washington, D.C. have been this week, in some ways, it’s the same as it's always been. That's not to say McCarthy's elevation — after 15 rounds of voting, by a single vote — is normal. After all, the power his speakership will hold is diminished. He is also one of 147 Republican members of Congress who voted to overturn the 2020 presidential election, and he's been characterized by many as an apologist for the Jan. 6 insurrectionists. It's important to have journalists like Eileen, with long memories, to put things in context. In a note to me, she wrote: “What Tip said that earned him a rebuke would hardly get noticed today. But you’ll see the parallels with the current moment in the focus on self-styled Republican ‘guerillas’ in 1984 on the internal workings of the House.” Indeed. Thank you for reading, Cloe Axelson Senior Editor, Cognoscenti [Follow]( Support the news   Must Reads [This Republican Party is a long time coming]( For all his complicity in this relentless chaos, the disorder in the GOP predates Donald Trump by at least four decades, writes Eileen McNamara. 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