Iowa Congressmen Rod Blum and Steve King opposed Boehner’s reelection
Speaker Boehner was reelected today as Speaker of the House in what turned out to be a single round of voting. Conservatives were hoping to achieve enough votes to force a second round of voting in the most substantial insurrection post Civil War. The purpose was to reflect and accentuate the message of deep dissatisfaction with Boehner’s performance on key matters to date.
Boehner was reelected in spite of an astounding rank and file Republican dissatisfaction with his tenure and portent. Members of the Republican House congressional caucus in support of Boehner displayed either disdain toward that sentiment or pathetic weakness to give Boehner a first ballot pass. If Speaker Boehner uses his powers to undermine, or fails to further critical action to stop: Obama’s unconstitutional executive orders, the inculcation of Obamacare, the implementation of amnesty for illegal immigrants, and all manner of correctives necessary to stop the Obamanation, we hope each and every one of the enablers has a primary challenger.
Roll Call provides an initial analysis of the vote including listing the twenty-five congressmen who opposed Boehner. That is a list of conservative leaders. A list of those in support was not available at this writing although all Republican members not mentioned can be inferred as supportive of Boehner, or as weak sisters. Iowa’s Congressman Steve King and Rod Blum were among the 25 conservative leaders. Iowa’s David Young was not.
Mario Cuomo reaches out
The vote in the House for Speaker is made up of those present and voting, a simple majority required. The full complement of the House is 435 and swearing-in day is normally a session that few if any would miss, with all in attendance a vote of 218 is required for election as Speaker. With such a large number eligible, the exigencies of life can be expected to result in a few missing.
As it was today 408 votes were cast. Accordingly 205 votes were necessary for victory. Speaker Boehner received 216 votes, which were all Republican and less the 25 who wanted a different Republican as Speaker. Receiving 164 votes was former Speaker Pelosi, all Democrats with four Democrats voting for someone else (assuredly not a Republican). As it happened a total of 168 Democrats voted for someone other than Boehner.
Inconveniently, the funeral of world-class sophist and Democrat icon Mario Cuomo, former Governor of New York and father of the current governor, was today. The Roll Call article referenced above suggests that the entire New York Democrat congressional delegation of 18 was absent from the vote in order to pay homage to the Roaring Lion liberal lion. That number in itself reduced the number of votes necessary for election to Speaker to one half of 417, or 209. But let’s say there was no funeral to attend. We can presume they would not have voted for Boehner. Their presence and voting would have resulted in 168 plus 18 plus the 25 Republicans or 211 wanting someone other than Boehner on the first ballot.
Our spin is that with those missing 18 added to the actual 408 present, the new threshold for first ballot victory would have been one half of 426 or 214. Boehner mustered only 216 but three of those according to the Roll Call article were of the following demeanor:
. . . freshman Brian Babin of Texas, who voted present, just as his predecessor, former Rep. Steve Stockman, voted at the start of the 113th Congress
Matt Salmon of Arizona and Stephen Fincher of Tennessee were in the chamber when their name was called, but both sat silent. In the end, when it was clear that insurgents didn’t have enough votes to bring the speaker election to a second ballot, both voted for Boehner.
In our scenario of Cuomo not dying or having been sped to his eternal reward sooner, the two fence straddlers by Roll Call’s estimation could have reduced Boehner’s vote to 214, and raised the others to 213 because they were willing to force a second ballot, with a clear shot. The “present” vote who obviously did not want Boehner might have been induced to support one of the other nominated Republicans which would have denied Boehner a majority on the first round.
The stalwart conservatives would not have budged without concession, or Boehner might have been deposed in favor of someone with more purpose to fight Obama. That it didn’t happen is one of the many whimpers that leads to the downfall of a Republic. It was easier to vote for the whimpering Boehner. As it was, even with an increased Republican compliment, Boehner actually received less votes than he did two years ago.
R Mall
