We don't, but procurer John Boehner will deserve every excruciating moment of the hydra-headed clusterfuck he's about to suffer. The upside for us, however, is that consequent voter backlash should arrive in a 2012 torrent that'll make this year's seem like a drizzle.
Politico previews the wicked fun: Rep. Steve "King and allies such as [Michele] Bachmann will push their leadership into what could be an uncomfortable confrontation with the White House, specifically on health care, threatening government shutdown if they don’t get their way."
And then there are the now-inevitable newcomers: "Many of these candidates are people who are new to public life," said Republican Congressman Peter Roskam. "So they will have an expectation of 'I said this in the campaign, and I’m going to do this in Congress.' "
Boehner, Cantor & Co. has had a high old time of it egging on tea-party challengers and whipping up mass ill will toward all things Obamian. But today's cranky public sentiment will morph into stupendous outrage once the GOP's promised realities set in: the House's (attempted) re-unleashing of health-insurance companies to summarily deny coverage or cancel policies; the House's cruel interruption of extended unemployment benefits; the House's idiotic contraction of government spending in a depressed, demandless economy; a ghastly government shutdown in which Treasury can't cut Social Security checks and Medicare can't process Medicare claims (hello, all you older, angry white voters); and so bloody on.
Boehner already foresees that his choices will be those of Hobson's. Even his passably moderate House members who appreciate the immense stupidity of tea-party ideology will also espy a troubled 2012 primary, should they make any attempts at rational governance -- at moving the country forward. The House GOP will, therefore, collapse under the obesity of its own counterproductive fraudulence.
That Boehner has made a Faustian bargain is perhaps the stuff of conspicuity and doubtlessly harmful to sound governance, but it sure will be fun to watch him and his party over the next two years go up in flames.