New House rules

To the editor:

With apologies to Bill Maher, I believe Kevin McCarthy’s historic ouster as House speaker is cause for a “new rule.” In keeping with GOP disarray, it seems appropriate to borrow the format of Family Feud. Under the new rule, the majority party has three tries to elect a speaker. 

If they fail to do so, the minority party, according to "Family Feud" format, is given the opportunity to make a "steal." For the "steal" to succeed, the minority party holds one vote. If a candidate receives unanimous support among his/her conference, that person is the new speaker with all the perks that go with it — setting House rules, naming committee heads and determining vote schedules and agendas.

While this may seem to be a frivolous proposal, I think it could have a very positive impact upon restoring order and discipline in the House and, by extension, help the American people.  Pressing a political party with a slim majority to reach consensus or lose power almost certainly would reduce the outsized influence held by a few extremists. What are the odds that someone like Matt Gaetz tries to vote out a fellow GOP speaker knowing that it means handing over the gavel to Hakeem Jeffries?

New Yorkers went through this nonsense in 2009, when Pedro Espada Jr. and Hiram Monserrate held the State Senate hostage to their demands. Ultimately, their own criminal tendencies proved their undoing. One can only hope that Gaetz and his GOP House colleague Jim Jordan, within the ironically named Freedom Caucus, arrive at the same fate.

Joseph Cannisi

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