The Latest Breaking News from Kevin McCarthy

Although the focus of most recent political news had been Kevin McCarthy’s increasingly desperate attempts to grovel his way to becoming America’s first invertebrate speaker of the House of Representatives, buried in the hoopla are genuine decisions to be made about how the nation’s democracy should function.

The absence of regular House rules during last week’s drawn out floor fight for House speaker produced an unexpected benefit: C-SPAN and other news organizations were able to show the country the whole dayslong battle in real time — including a near-fistfight between two congressmen — because of a pause…

Republicans have long claimed they are dedicated deficit hawks, blaming Democrats for growing deficits and debt. But two votes they cast after electing Kevin McCarthy as House speaker prove that Republicans are charlatans when it comes to deficit reduction.

Rep. Kevin McCarthy made many concessions in his bid to become speaker of the House. But his offer to allow the hard-line House Freedom Caucus to select three of the nine Republicans on the powerful House Committee on Rules stands out for its ability to diminish the influence of the…