Marjorie Taylor Greene and Mike Johnson: New players, same game
My intention for this morning was another philosophy-oriented post, but then Congress went and congressed all over the floor. Bad Congress! I write this morning of a persistent behavioral problem with one of the strays that Congress adopted, who goes by the name of Marjorie Taylor Greene. Sure, adopting strays is a moral good, as long as you spay and neuter them, because the last thing we need is more stray politicians in the world-- remember, politicians will rut with anyone and anything-- but of course, there will always be behavioral problems. Note, for example, Marjorie Taylor Greene. I humbly apologize for my failure to aim my space laser, and hence we are stuck with her. It was my responsibility, I did not take the shot, it is my fault. Anyway, we consider, this morning, the latest in the saga of the party that cannot govern. So much for the philosophy post I had intended. But as Bob Barker used to say when I had the flu as a kid, remember to spay or neuter your congressmen.
When the president is a Democrat and the House has a Republican majority, there is a structural problem under the current level of polarization. Some bills have "reversion" points instead of status quo points, meaning that failure to pass a bill will mean that instead of maintaining current policy, we revert to some ideologically extreme policy location, and under the current level of ideological polarization, a faction of the modern Republican Party is comfortable with those reversion points. Hence, they make no concessions to avoid the reversion points, and oust the leaders who do. That was what happened to John Boehner, then Kevin McCarthy, and it may happen to Mike Johnson. I wrote about this in my 2018 book, Incremental Polarization, I observed here that as soon as the GOP won the House in the face of a Biden presidency, the structural problem would return, McCarthy got sacked, and here we are again. Marjorie Taylor Greene is threatening a motion to vacate because Mike Johnson is not driving the fiscal car over the cliff and yelling "yeeeee-haaawwwww!!!!!" all the way down.
Perhaps you see why I have been enjoying the philosophy and literature posts. Tomorrow morning, more Salman Rushdie.
The players change, the moves don't. What does that tell you? It tells you that this is all structural. Consider the distinction between what we used to call the behavioralist and institutionalist perspectives on political science. The institutionalist perspective said that individual people were basically irrelevant, you studied rules and processes. The behavioralist perspective said that you studied incentives and preferences. Then, eventually, because we all have our heads up our asses in the pseudo-intellectual ouroboros, which is where you flip the connection (second ouroboros mention in a week!), we got "the new institutionalism!" Which is only a bit better than the new math. A little from column A, a little from column B, and if I am describing it casually, we might say that rules and structures are responsive to preferences.
Anyway, though, note the consistency. Note what happened in 2015, when the House of Representatives ousted John Boehner. The events were simple. There was a Democratic president, a Republican House, the Republican leader had to cut deals with Democrats to avoid reversion points, which angered the right flank, that right flank having no problem with the reversion points, which then ousted the Speaker. Move forward to 2023. The players were not even the same. McCarthy was the guy who couldn't get the job to replace Boehner in 2015, so Ryan got it instead. After absurdly many votes, the anti-McCarthy faction yielded, because it is a party of fools. McCarthy won a worthless gavel. McCarthy, though, had to cut deals because the structures were the same. Different president, different GOP rank-and-file (Gaetz was different), and ostensibly, Gaetz and others were motivated by personal issues with McCarthy.
But wait. Wasn't the outcome the same?
And now, we have Mike Johnson, and Marjorie Taylor Greene. Johnson is supposed to be a hero of the right flank of the party. Greene has no history of personal animosity towards Johnson to create a parallel to McCarthy-Gaetz. The players are all different, but the structures are the same. At some point, Johnson either cuts deals, or we go over those cliffs. You can change all of the players, and the structures are still there.
There are times when individuals and their incentives matter. And, there are times when structures matter. We could even argue that since the structural process is merely a reflection of extreme polarization and divided government, that's still behavioral, and we're back to "the new institutionalism," or some such. But at the end of the day, change all of the players, and the game is the same.
They could give Mike Johnson the boot, Marjorie Taylor Greene could catch a crippling case of botulism from not properly cooking her nightly roadkill, and the groundhog that Marjorie Taylor Greene failed to cook is symbolic of the day in which we live. Why? Because this is structural.
Eden Brent, "He'll Do The Same Thing To You," live. The studio version is on Mississippi Number One. What's better, her piano playing or her voice? Piano, I say.
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