For Right-Wing Republicans, Chaos Is the Order of the Day

The fact that Steve Scalise has to give up running for House speaker shows that in their quest for power, hard-liners don’t care about anything — not even war in the Middle East.

Briefly, really only briefly, there was a small glimmer of hope. For a few hours it actually looked as though Republican hardliners would give in over the disputed position of House speaker. It looked as if Steve Scalise would succeed Kevin McCarthy, and not McCarthy’s Republican Party rival, Jim Jordan. Progress would have been extremely modest; instead of an extreme right-leaning Donald Trump disciple like Jordan, an arch conservative would have taken a Republican majority in the House. But the extreme right wing would not allow it; instead, they persuaded Scalise to give up the race for speaker.

As long as there is no new speaker, Congress is practically incapable of doing anything. The interim budget will expire in mid-November, so Congress has to negotiate a new budget now. U.S. support, vital to Ukraine’s survival, also plays a central role. But hard-liners surrounding former President Trump see the billions in aid for a country attacked by Russia as a major thorn in the side of U.S. taxpayers in the spirit of “America First,” and they rail against it at every opportunity.

Trump Praises for Hezbollah

Now, however, Israel, even closer ally, is seeking U.S. support to strike back after the gruesome Hamas attacks. Not even the right-leaning hard-liners close to Rep. Matt Gaetz can find fault with that — even though the former president recently said the Lebanese militant group allied with Hamas “very smart.”

“Two nights ago I read all of Biden’s security people … they said, ‘Gee, I hope Hezbollah doesn’t attack from the north, because that’s the most vulnerable spot.’ I said, ‘Wait a minute. You know, Hezbollah is very smart.’ They’re all very smart,” Trump said during a recent campaign speech.

But not even the dramatic events in the Middle East can budge the extreme right. It takes every opportunity to increase their power and destroy the political system they despise, without regard even for events that could change the world. This is breathtakingly terrifying. As the U.S. presidential election approaches, the chaos is only likely to get worse.