Success comes with a price for Kevin McCarthy

It was Speaker McCarthy's victory that a Republican debt limit proposal with spending cuts and other rollbacks of Democratic priorities passed in the House this week. Despite the fact that the measure has no chance of being supported by the Senate Democrats or the President, it sets up a period of fierce conflict between the two sides even though the measure has no chance of winning their support.

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This week, it seemed like we might have a different outcome compared to what we had expected. As a result of the chaos of the speaker election in January, it seemed very likely that House Republicans would come to realize, given the narrow majority they have in the House, that anything that eventually passed into law would require a bipartisan coalition that would unite the middle against the ideological fringes.

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Besides the possibility of more chaos, it was also possible that McCarthy's job would be constantly threatened by the House, and we could witness more failed votes on the floor of the House, with the House proving ungovernable.

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However, McCarthy was able to work out a consensus around a bill that everyone knew was more about messaging than actually doing anything, that was somewhat surprising, at least with both moderate Republicans and far-right Republicans. A trajectory like this promises maximum conflict with the Democratic Senate and President Joe Biden. 

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Having voted in favor of raising debt limits and creating financial panic, the vote not only raises that likelihood, but also means that we are on the verge of a series of hostage-taking incidents and a government shutdown that is likely to occur in the fall, as well as the threat of a second debt-limit showdown in less than a year if the GOP extremists get their way.

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The House vote has three major lessons. The first lesson is McCarthy is capable of counting votes. Especially with such a small majority, McCarthy and his allies had been questioned even before the speaker-vote fiasco about whether they could handle the basic tasks of running the House. However, it appears they have succeeded.

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During the January rebellion against McCarthy, a group of House Republicans made a big show of supporting internal reforms that would restore the influence of House committees as well as individual members and their particular interests. We found out that it's still a top-down House. It seems that that was dead now. There are just as many top-down procedures in the McCarthy House as there were in the House of Nancy Pelosi or Paul Ryan: Deals that lead to bills are negotiated by the speaker or the speaker's representatives, and are not resolved by a committee.

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Furthermore, we have discovered that radical Republicans in the House want substantive influence over internal party rivalries. They are utilizing this newfound power to resolve internal disputes over bills. However, that shift in attitude does not mean that they are open to a deal-making process between the parties, so enacting any legislation will become more challenging as a result. There are a number of threats to the party that result from giving the extremists influence beyond the number of supporters that they have within the party. This reduces the likelihood of finding agreements on other important issues, such as immigration or foreign policy or issues affecting veterans.

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A cross-party coalition would have been more likely in the House if the committees had gained power; while chaos in the House may have prevented the majority party from blocking cross-party deals, it would have been more difficult.

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I am not sure if we are going to face much of a confrontation if Republicans stick together for McCarthy and pass a bill to make the radicals happy? We can only expect the worst.