The GOP’s right-wing Freedom Caucus, which includes Colorado Rep. Ken Buck, resisted the temptation Wednesday to embarrass itself, despite rumblings in its ranks, and instead came out in support of Paul Ryan for House speaker. It should not have been such a difficult call.
It wasn’t so long ago that the powerful job of House speaker was highly coveted. But the fact that Ryan, chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee and former candidate for vice president, had to be implored to throw his hat into the ring confirms those days are gone.
Ryan earlier this week finally agreed to serve as speaker if all GOP factions would unite behind him. It would have been blindly self-destructive had they refused.
For a while, however, it looked like the Freedom Caucus might walk off the cliff, as a number of its members criticized Ryan’s candidacy or his demands. But as Wednesday wore on they emerged to declare that “supermajority of the House Freedom Caucus has voted to support Paul Ryan’s bid.” Common sense prevailed.
Unlike current Speaker John Boehner, the still youthful Ryan is a polished communicator and someone who enjoys making the case for his party’s positions. Moreover, he is respected across much of the political spectrum for his intelligence and mastery of difficult policies.
The fact that he lately has been excoriated by some of the right-wing megaphones on talk radio and alternative media as insufficiently conservative reveals how far from the mainstream they have veered. While Ryan doesn’t adhere to the punitively anti-immigrant views of the Trump wing of the party, his credentials as a fiscal conservative are almost unrivaled.
At times, the hardliners of the Freedom Caucus have appeared more interested in symbolic gestures and political theater than in constructive governance. Had they rejected Ryan’s candidacy for speaker, they would have written the oddest chapter yet in their record of obstruction.
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