This just in: Republicans have a new flavor of the day in the Speaker’s race: Mike Johnson of Louisiana.  Johnson seems fine to us. He’s a fiscal conservative and right on most of the economic issues (as far as we can tell). But count us skeptical that Johnson or ANYONE can get 217 votes in these crazy new rules for electing a speaker.

We ran this humor item a week ago in the HOTLINE showing the floor of the House of Representatives inside the Capitol – filled with clowns. They didn’t get the message. One of our readers even commented that this cartoon was an insult to clowns.

The House GOP is contorted into the shape of a pretzel right now and at a time when we have a hapless President who seems to screw up everything he touches, Republicans somehow look even less ready for prime time right now.

Back in 1974 when both President Nixon and Vice President Agnew resigned and the country was in turmoil, Bill Buckley proposed that maybe the president should be a wildly popular and proven winner that the country could truly rally behind: triple crown winner Secretariat.

Most conservatives would like to see Johnson prevail today. But, the nightmare scenario is that this never-ending charade will only be resolved with Repubs choosing a C-list/least common denominator Speaker. At a time of great economic and national security peril when we need a General Eisenhower running the House, we are on track to get a Speaker Gomer Pyle…and then 18 months from now a Speaker Hakeem Jeffries.