Kevin McCarthy is barking mad

Too often in public life, our leaders are afraid to speak the truth about the hard issues, to focus the American people on what really matters.

Fortunately, Kevin McCarthy is not one of those timid leaders. And in the wee hours of Friday morning, he bravely stepped forward and forced the House of Representatives — nay, all of America — to face the truth . . . about the deli he operated when he was 19.

"I got fact-checked from The Washington Post on whether I won the lottery and whether I had a deli!" the irate House Republican leader shouted on the House floor. ". . . I can't believe how far people will go to try to take control or bring somebody down!"

No! The inhumanity!

Actually, the fact check, done nearly four years ago, withheld judgment. But McCarthy was INFURIATED!

"You know, it's interesting, one of my top-selling sandwiches still sells in some of the delis back home," he inveighed, "but the fact-checker says it's not true."

There is no justice in the world.

Is this what Republicans want in their future speaker of the House? It was 3 a.m. on the floor when McCarthy spoke the hard truths about the deli, about 6½ hours into an 8½-hour speech that was ostensibly about President Biden's Build Back Better agenda. As a practical matter, the speech achieved nothing but postpone the bill's passage until midmorning on Friday.

But the oratorical marathon did give McCarthy title to the longest speech in House history; he bested Nancy Pelosi's 2018 effort, though she did it in stilettos. And though he doesn't (yet) have a majority in the chamber, Thursday night's speech alone already ranks McCarthy among the most entertaining House speakers of all time.

To the extent McCarthy had a theme, it was that he was very, very angry — about everything, and it's all Democrats' fault. Part Donald Trump and part Howard Beale, McCarthy seemed to think that what Republicans crave is rage — partisan, purposeless, inchoate and ungrammatical rage.

When one Democrat gave him the (standard) admonition to address his remarks to the speaker, McCarthy flew into a fury. "I can look anywhere I want, Mr. Speaker! . . . They now want to dictate to a member of the floor of where I can look! Are you afraid of the basis of the information in the bill?! Sir, I'm gladly to look at you, Mr. Speaker!"

One hour into his speech, he complained that under Democratic rule, there are just too many jobs in America. "Walk down any main street," he said, "and I guarantee you there will be 'Help Wanted' signs!"

Two hours in, he offered lessons on the Cold War: "Picture America at a swim meet after World War II against every other country."

Around the three-hour mark, he got to takeaways from the '80s, which he apparently learned from a 1984 movie. "There were two Germanys! I remember in my high school they had one of those hallmark shows about the Soviet Union invading us, a 'Red Dawn.' "

At four hours, he challenged the presiding officer to a bet: "Let's wager dinner."

He was growing progressively less coherent. "Does McDonald's still have the dollar meal?" he inquired.

McCarthy has long had difficulty ordering words and thoughts when speaking in public. But on Thursday night, he waged the battle on a grand scale. He condemned the "liberal on-cave of Seattle" and asserted that "Reagan came into office after Jimmy Carter make inflation high." He scolded Democrats: "You're celebrating it when inflation is at a 31 percent high!"

He misquoted the Gettysburg Address. He delivered messages from Abraham Lincoln and Ronald Reagan. "I'd love to debate Jim Crow one day," he remarked. He mentioned Hitler, Mussolini, Jimmy Carter's sweater and the provenance of baby carrots. He extolled the freedoms enjoyed by the Chinese people: "I promise you this. China is not adding 87,000 IRS agents to go after their people." He asked the House: "You know what Taiwan is?"

He lamented that "I can't even afford to test drive a Tesla, and Elon [Musk] is one of my best friends." He said he couldn't afford Nancy Pelosi's refrigerator; he imitated her in falsetto. And using hand gestures, he provided the House an explanation of Israel's antimissile system: "You see, the Iron Dome is not hypersonics."

How could such a high official in the United States sound so barking mad?

Approaching the midway point, McCarthy offered a clue about his state of mind. "Madam Speaker, today I got my booster shot," he reported. "I got a little headache now."

Research shows that for some people, a side effect of the coronavirus vaccine is irritability. In the most extreme cases, the effect is so bad they even get angry at fact-checkers.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Commentary: House minority leader Kevin McCarthy has lost his mind