"What he was not privately predicting was that the beatings would continue for an entire week. 'He knew he was going to get fucked — he just didn’t know they were going to fuck him this many times, or this hard,' explained one congressional aide."
Writes Asawin Suebsaeng in "Sex Trafficking Row Helped Fuel Gaetz’s Hatred for McCarthy" (Rolling Stone).
Literal sex (that may not have happened) and metaphorical sex (of the gang rape kind).
Shall we read Rolling Stone?
According to two sources familiar with the matter, Gaetz has been furious at McCarthy for the perceived lack of support [when he was 'the target of a federal investigation into the sex trafficking of a minor']— despite the fact that McCarthy did not strip him of any committee assignments during the probe.
The enmity between the two Republicans spilled into open view on the floor of the House during the 14th vote Friday night that McCarthy had bragged would finally put him over the top to secure the speaker’s gavel. Gaetz placed himself at the center of the drama. He skipped his turn in the alphabetical role call vote, setting himself up to vote at the end of the proceeding. With McCarthy needing one more yes vote, Gaetz instead voted “present” — leaving McCarthy with 50 percent of the vote, a hair short of victory.
McCarthy strode up to Gaetz on the House floor, and a the [sic] foes had a heated exchange that did not change the total. McCarthy again was left hanging....
Rolling Stone contacted members of Congress, sources on Capitol Hill, and activists in conservative organizations to ask what the root cause was. They all just knew Gaetz hated the House GOP leader.
Those last 2 sentences, together, contain an unstated proposition that can't possibly be true: Everyone contacted chose to answer. I can easily believe that everyone who did answer purported to know that Gaetz hates McCarthy. The phrase "just know" is ambiguous. It could mean either that they instinctively know or that they didn't know anything else. But I'll keep reading anyway.
The headline says the "sex trafficking row" was at the root of Gaetz's enmity, but I can't find support for that in the text of the article. I've read to the end now, and I've got to say I think the writer really did use the phrase "just know" to me they didn't know anything else. Gaetz hates McCarthy. But why?
Eventually, the article ends up using Gaetz's own account:
Asked to comment on reports that he personally despises McCarthy — and that his loathing was intensified by McCarthy’s failure to aggressively stand up for him during the sex-crimes probe — Gaetz’s office did not deny it.
They didn't affirm it either! What a pathetic basis for the headline.
Instead, they pointed Rolling Stone to a TV interview on Thursday in which the congressman said he would not vote for McCarthy “under almost any circumstance,” while insisting his motivation was principled, not personal.
In other words, they did deny it! Oh! This article is maddeningly deceptive!
“Kevin McCarthy is the masthead of the lobby core,” Gaetz told Fox News’ Laura Ingraham when asked point-blank if his grudge against McCarthy was personal. “I resent the extent to which Kevin McCarthy utilizes the lobbyists and the special interests to be able to dictate how political decisions are made, how policy decisions are made, and how leadership decisions are made. Kevin McCarthy has been in the leadership for 14 years, and he has sold shares of himself to special interests, to political action committees. And so that’s why I don’t think he is an appropriate choice.”
But Rolling Stone went with its trashy headline anyway.
ADDED: Here's C-SPAN video of McCarthy approaching Gaetz right after his "present" vote:
ALSO: Gaetz moving his vote to "present" improved McCarthy's position, as the NYT article on the subject makes clear:
[On the 14th vote, t]wo Republicans who had withheld their support from Mr. McCarthy — Representatives Matt Gaetz of Florida and Lauren Boebert of Colorado —voted “present,” lowering the threshold for him to win to 217 votes but still leaving him one vote short....
McCarthy won on the 15th vote not because any of the last 6 holdouts voted for him, but only because all of the 6 switched to voting "present" instead of voting for someone else. McCarthy got the same number of votes — 216 — but that number was, finally, a majority. Gaetz had the opportunity as the last person voting on the 14th vote to give McCarthy his victory. He didn't do it, but he laid the groundwork for the 15th vote.
Posts
68 comments:
But Rolling Stone went with its trashy headline anyway.
and This, should surprise, exactly: NO ONE
Whether Gaetz has personal animosity toward McCarthy is irrelevant to me. Gaetz et al were right to try to break the House norms of the past 15 years. Will be interesting to see if there are any noticeable changes over these next two years.
It wouldn’t be politically astute to air out loud your own personal animosity towards a fellow politician.
See AOC viral House floor moment when she is seen talking to a GOP member who got removed from his committees after he posted an anime video of a character with his head attacking and killing a character with AOC head on it.
If AOC can grasp that political reality…
The Rolling Stone wanted to smear Gaetz one more time with the sex trafficking stuff and continue the narrative that the Republicans are in chaos due to the crazy, extreme Trump wing.
In reality, the few Republicans who are trying to change things and break the system that protects and benefits the longest serving, most compromised and corrupt members of Congress.
It would be easy for the GOPe to largely shut these few guys out of the process almost entirely if they didn't fight back every way they could. That's what they are trying to prevent. The MAGA wing have been negotiating for committee assignments and commitments on issues that are important to them and their constituents.
I don't see how these MAGA guys are the bad guys because they won't just shut up and get in line. Rolling Stone now writes in defense of The System and against those who are fighting The System. Remember when they...oh forget it.
Rolling Stone sure seems to like posting fabricated, implausible rape storylines for some reason. It would be refreshing if they did real journalism or even good fiction for a change.
The picture at the NYPost of one guy restraining another from beating the crap out of Gaetz is way more juicy, but I guess Rolling Stone went to print with something they'd already massaged.
I'm quite content with how this battle rolled out, and I wrote my Congress Critter to thank him.
100% with Bob Boyd's comment. And double on Rolling Stone's angle, and its evolution into the fat old rich Uncle of the establishment.
I think any ferment among the Republicans is good. Is the dog that didn't bark here that Trump was put into nomination but only got one vote?
In other words, they did deny it! Oh! This article is maddeningly deceptive!.
Which is why I'm grateful you wade through this dreck. Periodically with a nod to due diligence, I wade into one of these stories. Always the same, nothing but a writers 750 words of ad hominem attacks, supported by others sharing their ad hominem attack packed in a fact free narrative advancing, screed.
Despite McCarthy’s embarrassment, it’s notable that no viable alternative emerged ballot after ballot. In the end, I think this will help him.
Great. "Muh principles" from a third-rate showboat like Gaetz.
We don't have a majority party, just as we didn't when when Boehner and Ryan were speakers. We have 200+ regular Republicans, 20+ Freedom Caucus members (left over in spirit from the 2010 Tea Party election intake and taken over by squareheads like Boebert, Biggs, and Gaetz) and 212 Democrats. Just think what would have happened if the Greens took over 10% of the Democrat seats in the last two congresses...oh, wait...
The Democrats hung together with an authoritarian lust for power and coalesced around one idea: get Trump! The Republicans would rather fight each other. It's easier that way.
Drama!
Controversy!
Clicks!
As a former constituent of Matt Gaetz when he was in the FL and then Federal legislature I found the article interesting and reasonable in its opinions.
He isn't the one getting fucked....WE ARE.
The angle glossed over is the potential that Gaetz animosity is based on observations of corruption as described to Laura Ingraham, and that the allegation of sex trafficking was made to discredit Gaetz and divert attention to Gaetz concerns about McCarthy.
Reminds me of the Steele Dossier.
Sorry Kevin, your Jan6 symbolism got denied. DENIED.
LOL get fucked.
A @wef operative was just hammered into the #Speakerofthehouse position.
Good luck with that.
I never watch Tucker. Yet, never isn’t foolproof as I happened to catch his show on 1/5 where Kellyanne was interviewed. She’s the best, IMhumbleO. She said wrangling agreement so everyone is heard is “what Democracy looks like”.
I paraphrased.
She said she prefers dissent and it’s ugly process to take place behind closed doors, but that it’s healthy. Unlike the lock-stepping(jackbooting) Democrats who go along to get along(I’d sooner think: get along to go along) as long as the trip is more power.
It was a good explanation of the messy Republican personalities agreeing- w/disagreement.
According to reports, concessions made by McCarthy include:
A hard line on the debt limit
Votes on term limits and border security
McCarthy’s leadership PAC will stay out of open primaries
“Open rules” on spending measures, and the ability to bring up stand-alone appropriation bills
Discretionary spending cap
A commitment to set up a committee on the “weaponization” of the government
Why do Republicans members have to fight this hard with their own party for a vote on border security for Chrissakes? Or on weaponization of agencies like the FBI? Or on debt limits and spending caps? What the hell?
I hope things don't get any easier for McCarthy going forward.
iowan2 and Bob Boyd
++
I looked at Drudge this AM. He labels it "McCarthy Hearings".
This is the Biggest! Thing! Ever! to Rolling Stone and maybe a couple of hundred other people in the nation of 330 million.
To the rest of us, Congress went 4 extra days without a Speaker.
What is a Speaker? This in a nation where the average person can name more Kardashians than SCOTUS justices.
There is a small possibility that McC will be chastened a bit and Congress will be more responsible as a result of all this.
There is a much larger possibility that a year from now, nothing will have been changed at all from this week of Drama.
Also, what Bob Boyd said.
I don't read Rolling Stone about Republican politics for the same kinds of reasons the that guy from Palookaville doesn't read about health food fads, the pure predicability of it.
The pro-war guy got bloodied up, and his ability to make back-room deals with Joe Biden to send guns and money to Hunter Biden's clients is now severely restricted. Good. No more blank checks and secret deals for Ukraine in Biden's term. This is the first serious political defeat that the Ukrainian side has suffered in the West, despite the unpopularity of this war with normal people. But they sure did push hard to overrule the voters, didn't they.
“This article is maddeningly deceptive!”
It’s Rolling Stone and truth is not their mission, as they’ve shown many, many times. Their webpage is not worth visiting, ever.
A story on the same subject from a two days ago, the only other one on the subject I found this morning.
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2023/jan/5/vendetta-matt-gaetz-accused-mixing-personal-animos/
In looking for other coverage, I saw this from a Townhall writer, Spencer Brown, Managing Editor at Townhall:
https://twitter.com/itsSpencerBrown/status/1611575303742136327
The photo is apparently offered to show an intimidating confrontation between Gaetz and another Congressman. But it appears that the other Congressman is Rep. Andy Harris (MD), an ally of Gaetz in the whole McCarthy speakership election, who was sitting with Gaetz, Boebert and other holdouts during that night's voting.
... misleading coverage from another side of wing-nut so-called "journalism".
I know Gaetz was involved in some kind of sex scandal, but I didn't follow the details. The scandal didn't involve a sex tape or a celeb so it wasn't that interesting. Didn't he get completely exonerated or just semi-exonerated? The scandal sort of evaporated. The part of the Rolling Stone article didn't make the nature of his scandal or his innocence clear. If he got re-elected, I'm presuming he cleared his name. That's not always a proper guideline though. Kennedy got re-elected after killing a young woman.
But Rolling Stone went with its trashy headline anyway.
It's Rolling Stone, not...well, I was going to say "The New York Times", but they're just as bad now...
This debate over whether authoritarian (Pelosi) or representative (McCarthy-Gaetz-whoever comes next) government is more effective has been going on as a theme in US history since Francis Parkman wrote "France and England in North America." Only seven volumes long, Parkman's history is an easy read for anyone wanting a bit of background on this Rolling Stone article. Parkman wanted to show that representative government (England) was, in the end, more effective, than authoritarian government (France). It was often clear that the authoritarian side, the French King alone, was more effective but it became clear that representative government, the British King and Parliament, had its prevailing strengths and won - that time. That was the period 1567-1763 and that victory directly emboldened the colonists to challenge the British King and Parliament on behalf of a yet more representative form of government - a republic. Again, representative government won. But the debate is ongoing - tyranny offers its adherents so much - the chance to lie, cheat and steal with the blessing of the government and even of elements in the churches. It stands to reason the sons of ... Pelsi ... will keep coming back for another try.
An orgy of political porn.
Off topic, but here's an interesting sex scandal. Issac Babel, the Russian writer, had an extramarital affair with the wife of the director of the NKVD. Talk about risky affairs! Babel was working close to the horns as it were...... Babel was arrested and killed by the NKVD but here's the twist O'Henry ending. He wasn't killed by Yezhov whose wife he was having an affair with. He was killed by Yezhov's successor. Babel's crime? He socialized with Yezhov and his wife, and Beria had determined that Yezhov was in charge of some kind of traitorous network that Babel was a part of. I defy anyone to find the moral of this story.
Did the Church Commission make any difference? Were substantive positive changes made at the CIA?
Or was the American public just informed about the CIA’s corruption and stupid ideas?
“Maddeningly deceptive” should be the media’s motto. It’s certainly SOP for ‘em.
Rolling STone - LOL
Much like Vanity Fair
Democrat Party Hack News.
McCarthy *wishes* that Gaetz's enmity was the main reason it took a week to garner confirmation.
Rolling Stone should stick to music.
Beyonce number 8 singer of all time.
Nevermind.
The only thing puzzling to me was why Matt Gaetz didn't nominate himself to be Speaker of the House.
Yup sometimes you do get what you deserve.This is the best they got?
Nice to see some fight. His pac staying out of open races tells me that the gope have been really messing over some potential candidates. Whether he will or not would mean an immediate vote on his speakership. Heh.
Just sent a note thanking my representative Michael Cloud for fighting for some freedom from our current tyrant leadership.
There's horrible journalism......there's truly terrible journalism......and then there's Rolling Stone.
@farmgirl - I 100% agree with the proposition that this is what democracy looks like and that’s great, but I would prefer the transparency of it happening in plain view in a constructive way. I fear one of the worst things about our culture now is we can’t abide any legit differences of opinion, voiced passionately. We should revel in that dust…we’d all be better educated on the issues and then make more informed choices when voting, no matter our individual priorities.
Bob Boyd said...
Why do Republicans members have to fight this hard with their own party for a vote on border security for Chrissakes? Or on weaponization of agencies like the FBI? Or on debt limits and spending caps? What the hell?
I hope things don't get any easier for McCarthy going forward.
The media bubble that Ann hides in hid all of this from the American people and just quoted shitheads like Eyepatch McCain calling the holdouts terrorists.
You had to go out to the Trashy stuff to find out what this is all about.
It is hard to be more pathetic and worthless a publication than the Rolling Stones by the way.
Amadeus 48 said...
Great. "Muh principles" from a third-rate showboat like Gaetz.
Who do you think is closer to what the voters want?
Less than half of Republican voters wanted McCarthy.
We don't have a majority party, just as we didn't when when Boehner and Ryan were speakers.
That is because Boehner and Ryan were democrats in all but name.
Nobody fought for open borders harder and more deceptively than Paul Ryan.
There are maybe 100 republican voters that actually like Paul Ryan.
The rest of us hate liars and traitors.
Ever notice how enemies of the deep state get embroiled in sex scandals, even where evidence is scant, and friends of the deep state can skate despite overwhelming evidence? The Catholic Church has been rightly excoriated for what happened, but still the Epstein client list remains secret.
Okay, now explain Rolling Stone's The 200 Greatest Singers of All Time.
Thank goodness our long week of darkness without a duly constituted legislature has ended. Now they can resume looting the treasury.
"Shall we read Rolling Stone?"
******************
Fuck, YEAH!!!
Obviously, the old masthead motto ---"All the News that's Fit to Print"----no longer applies to lefty journos.
Stay classy, Rolling Stone!!!
'He knew he was going to get fucked — he just didn’t know they were going to fuck him this many times, or this hard,'
Hmm ... Wasn't that what John Adams said about Thomas Jefferson? Or was it what Alexander Hamilton said about Aaron Burr?
Pelosi was shamelessly over the top as Speaker, but that seems to fit the current culture. Nondescript gray blurs like McCarthy really don't go over well now. And we figure politicians are probably corrupt or depraved anyway, so why try to hide it? Why not at least not be boring?
The Rolling Stone must be slipping - usually a story like this would have the Republican caucus being subjected to drunken gang rape allegations by a reformed stripper and pole-dancer.
"Obviously, the old masthead motto ---"All the News that's Fit to Print"..."
The Rolling Stone masthead variation on the NYT was "All the news that fits."
Very interesting and a great first quote to hook the reader.
But here's one for AA: why is 'getting fucked' considered a bad thing?
Break out the OED!
I saw the same list of 'concessions' that McCarthy offered as Bob Boyd at 7:44 and had the same thought. These all seem pretty straightforward and many are outright desirable. If all this tempest in a teapot actually brings back stand alone appropriation bills and does away with 7000 page omnibus pork bill it will be a blessing.
Tim In Vermont -
We notice that Epstein is conveniently dead - while the cameras were turned off.
We notice his deep state elite Clinton clients are all free and clear.
Where the hell do McCarthy's loyalties lie if voting on border security is a concession?
Here's guy who was just elected in the House to be the leader of the Republican Party and bills on spending and debt are concessions for him.
It's pointless to call oneself a conservative anymore. There is nothing left to conserve. If border security and spending limits make me a radical, so be it. I embrace the name. I'm going to start calling myself a radical. I'm adopting a wild-eyed look. I'm practicing it in the mirror right now. And I'm done combing my hair. Fuck it.
I'll simply say that unlike the Democratic Party, which is nothing but kool-aid drinking clones, the Republicans actually have a few independent thinkers within their ranks and more than a few of them would like the House to follow the traditional House rules. The way Pelosi ran this thing was the way a cartel runs it's thing. One boss. A few lieutenants, and everybody else ready to fall in line or...disappear. No debates. And no time to discuss, amend, or read any bills. Just say YES! and call the Republicans racist for not going along.
Sure, some Dems may wave their arms about and get the press to carry some hot quotes for them, but after Nancy or one of her lieutenants gets them behind closed doors, you never seem to hear much from them again. It's hard to demand things when your grandmother has Gerald Nadler holding a knife to her throat. Or was that a slice of pizza? Anyway...
The Republican Party is changing. But that change comes slowly and will require fighting among themselves. That used to be the way of politics. Since Obama, when all Dems were retrained to simply nod and say, "Yessir, May I have another", they've been pretty submissive to whomever their Dominatrix has been. As of late it was Speaker "Don't call me Nancy" Pelosi, who was known for her most used political slogan, "I will f*** you up."
Now McCarthy is going to be tested and pushed. But he's in the Boss seat now. We'll see how Gaetz does. I wonder if his grandmother is still around.
"Sources familiar with the matter" sounds so much better than "gossip".
It was like an old-fashioned heavyweight championship fight. It went fifteen rounds. All that was missing was Johnny Addie to announce the results.
Rolling stone magazine is a leftwing magazine that has a record of lying and putting out Anti-Conservative and anti-chrisitan propaganda and hit pieces. They're the last people I would read for the true facts behind an intra-Republican party dispute.
And its been that way for a long time. Hunter Thompson was the Rolling stone political/foreign affaris reporter for a while. You many enjoy HST's style, but the idea that you were getting any sort of objective truth from him was a joke.
Now, their reporters are still engage in leftwing fantasy, they just aren't funny or stylish in any way.
"We have 200+ regular Republicans"
And that, right there, is the problem with the GOP as an opposition party, Amadeus. They are not conservatives in the sense of conserving anything. They are, at best, place-holders between the times the Democrats use their majorities to move the country towards socialism and fascism.
It is over- you have just seen the very last Republican Speaker chosen. When the Democrats win the elections in 2024 over these "regular Republicans", they will make sure they never lose another election.
I don't know what Gaetz' beef with McCarthy is about, but I don't doubt for a second that his Republican colleagues treated him like a pile of dog shit after the DoJ and the media went after him with what was pretty obviously a fake scandal. How do I know it was all made up? Because the DoJ would not have missed an opportunity to take Gaetz down if there was even a smidgen of actual guilt.
"All the news we see fit to print" is denotatively equivalent to their actual motto, and connotatively more accurate, less sleight of hand.
Imagine if the $1.7 trillion dollar monstrosity had been as vigorously debated. I would have a lot more respect for my government today.
William said
"Babel was arrested and killed by the NKVD but here's the twist O'Henry ending. He wasn't killed by Yezhov whose wife he was having an affair with. He was killed by Yezhov's successor. Babel's crime? He socialized with Yezhov and his wife, and Beria had determined that Yezhov was in charge of some kind of traitorous network that Babel was a part of. I defy anyone to find the moral of this story."
The moral is: "Don't be born in Russia."
All the news that fits the narrative.
Matt Gaetz is like the free space in the middle of a bingo card: you can say just about anything about him and still score points.
Shall we read Rolling Stone?
Not if we’re looking for factual reporting or anything approaching honest journalism. Silly, silly Althouse thinks she will gain insight into Republicans by reading lefty extremist pubs like Rolling Stone, the New York Times, or the Washington Post.
'Why do Republicans members have to fight this hard with their own party for a vote on border security for Chrissakes? Or on weaponization of agencies like the FBI? Or on debt limits and spending caps? What the hell?'
$64,000 question...
"The moral is: "Don't be born in Russia."
Any more racist stuff you would like to add to the conversation?
We are sending weapons to people who plan to cleanse any traditionally Russia territories in Ukraine, like Donbas and Crimea, of ethnic Russians, just like they cleansed the Poles and Jews out of that sacred patch of Ukrainian soil that Hitler gave to Stalin in their famous pact at the outset of WWII. The architect of that cleansing, Bandera, is a national here in Ukraine today.
Bob Boyd said...
Where the hell do McCarthy's loyalties lie if voting on border security is a concession?
Here's guy who was just elected in the House to be the leader of the Republican Party and bills on spending and debt are concessions for him.
It's pointless to call oneself a conservative anymore. There is nothing left to conserve. If border security and spending limits make me a radical, so be it. I embrace the name.
Me too. Yancy has the answer on Gaetz.
Blogger Yancey Ward said...
I don't know what Gaetz' beef with McCarthy is about, but I don't doubt for a second that his Republican colleagues treated him like a pile of dog shit after the DoJ and the media went after him with what was pretty obviously a fake scandal. How do I know it was all made up? Because the DoJ would not have missed an opportunity to take Gaetz down if there was even a smidgen of actual guilt.
Ask those 600 or 700 people in Garland's archipelago if ethics would have slowed the DOJ if it could take down a Republican ?
Rolling Stone aside, Gaetz is a tool who dis-serves his constituents and deserves any metaphorical punch in the face. He's only in Congress because his corrupt daddies (real dad and the Marco one) got him out of trouble in Florida over and over again. If he and MTG (a sharper tool than at first expected) had rallied in an ordinary, organized way for Steve Scalise, there would have been a better chance for real leadership change.
The last bloody thing we need are Democrat-like political dynasties. Kennedy, cough.
Rolling, rolling, rolling. Keep on rolling...
Gaetz may not have personal animosity toward McCarthy, but you can be sure the reverse is now true. And McCarthy will spend the next 2 years getting his revenge, rather than doing anything useful for the republic.
He's a snake.
Post a Comment