Eight Republicans — Andy Biggs of Arizona, Ken Buck of Colorado, Tim Burchett of Tennessee, Eli Crane of Arizona, Matt Gaetz of Florida, Bob Good of Virginia, Nancy Mace of South Carolina, Matt Rosendale of Montana — banded together with a united Democrat conference to declare the office of speaker vacant by a vote of 216-210, removing McCarthy (R-Calif.) from power and thrusting the chamber into chaos as it faces a grinding process to pick his replacement.

The prospect of a revolt against McCarthy, 58, had been dangled for several months by Gaetz, his chief Republican antagonist.

Gaetz, 41, finally went ahead with the motion to vacate Monday night, after a weekend of stewing over the speaker’s decision to call up a stopgap spending bill to avoid a partial government shutdown — and rely on Democratic votes to get the measure through.

In the same fashion, Speaker McCarthy betrayed the conservative wing that allowed him to take power by depending on squish Republicans and a unanimous vote of his opposition to pass a 45-day clean continuing resolution keeping federal funding at its outrageously bloated fiscal 2023 levels.

Moreover, there is virtually no prospect of matters being different 40 days hence. As Freedom Caucus conservatives warned in signaling their opposition to yet another “CR,” the threat of a government shutdown will for the 27th year in a row put budget-cutters’ backs to the wall and raise, to the boiling point, pressures for another 12 months of unaccountable spending.

But just as important, reclaiming the power of the purse at any cost is vital to confronting straight-on the radical progressive and elitist cabal and avoiding the endless series of train wrecks toward which it has set America barreling. 

Again, not just debt and economic crash. But also nonexistent borders driving down wages, straining resources, and fomenting a fentanyl death spiral. Breakdown of civil and social order, from fractured families to fertility collapse to gender-bending to lawless streets and subways, even as the justice system at every level is weaponized against political opponents.

Permanent blackouts, along with energy poverty and confiscation of essentials from guns to gas stoves to gas-powered cars. Social scoring and cancellation. All ultimately leading to a virtual prison state eliminating not just freedom of conscience but also commerce, enterprise, wealth creation, mobility, housing, self-defense, intimacy, family formation and expression – in exchange for apportioned messes of pottage from the all-powerful Nanny State.

To advance this overthrow of democratic norms, the ruling cabal has blockaded every conceivable political, economic, social, cultural, and judicial avenue for reform. Including, yes, elections. After the certifiably unlawful tactics employed in the 2020 contest and the equally suspicious sputtering of the anticipated 2022 “Red Wave,” can anyone count on the 2024 vote to turn the tide?

Resistance must start someplace – and a good place to start is Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz’s maneuver to unceremoniously force McCarthy from power via a motion to vacate, rinsing and repeating if necessary until the desired effect is achieved.