'It's pathetic' to 'Greek tragedy:' Crazy ways cable news covered Kevin McCarthy's ousting

How much history are we going to be witness to?

The U.S. House of Representatives voted Tuesday to remove Rep. Kevin McCarthy as Speaker of the House. It was the first time it ever happened — it was only the second time it had ever been attempted, after an unsuccessful try in 1910 — and cable news coverage was appropriately wild.

Put another way, media coverage reflects what’s going on, and what was going on was nuts. It was like a movie with no heroes, no one to root for. McCarthy’s leadership demise was authored by Rep. Matt Gaetz, who beamed so much in a scrum of reporters afterward he practically glowed. He wanted attention, and he got it. Of course, not all of it was positive attention.

How many Republicans voted to oust McCarthy?

“He comes out of this a winner,” Jonah Goldberg, a political commentator, said on CNN. “If he doesn’t get beaten to death by the other members in the House gym.”

That was the tenor of things.

“It’s pathetic,” Greg Gutfeld said on “The Five” on Fox News. He and the other panelists got a few choice words in before moving on to more Fox News-like subjects, like that old chestnut, Hunter Biden.

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Tim Burchett gave a remarkable interview to Jake Tapper

Over on CNN, Jake Tapper conducted a remarkable interview with Rep. Tim Burchett, one of the eight Republicans who voted with Democrats to remove McCarthy, providing the needed votes. Burchett told a clearly surprised Tapper that during a meeting before the vote he told McCarthy he was praying about his decision — and that McCarthy mocked him.

“I’m sorry, but I find this so shocking,” Tapper said.

Burchett declined to be specific about what McCarthy said to him. “But when someone mocks me like that, and mocks my religion, honestly, the bible is pretty clear about God being mocked,” he said. “So that’s what sealed it right there for me. I said, this is not the quality or the character of person that I want as speaker of the United States.”

Tapper, still in disbelief, said, “Yeah, I can’t understand that at all.”

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Meanwhile, a judge was silencing Donald Trump

What a day. As this was going on a judge in New York ordered former President Donald Trump, in the middle of a civil fraud trial, not to attack or comment on court staff, after Trump spent time doing just that on his Truth Social platform.

How do you get crazier than that?

Hold my beer, House Republicans said.

“Pandering to the loudest element is not the way to lead, and plants the seeds of your own self-destruction,” said Democratic House member Gerry Connolly on MSNBC. “I think we witnessed almost a Greek tragedy today in terms of Kevin McCarthy's self-destruction.”

Tapper also echoed a common sentiment among those covering the story.

“A completely self-inflicted wound by the House GOP,” he said.

Evidently it was the kind of thing that lent itself to classical comparison. “This is one of the most unsurprising, shocking stories in a very long time,” Goldberg said. “It’s very Aesopian.” He then referenced the fable about the scorpion and the frog.

Gaetz is the scorpion in this scenario, to be clear.

Leave it to Fox News to undermine a historic event that doesn't suit their agenda

At the other end of the spectrum, there was Gutfeld on Fox News.

“I get it,” he said. “It’s a historic event, but it’s, like, one of the few historic events that I don’t care about. This has no effect on our viewers.”

In case you were wondering.

Not smarmy enough for you, even from Gutfeld? Don’t worry, he can go lower.

Bemoaning how the GOP infighting took attention away from issues like inflation and the border — imagine him banging that drum — he said, “Every time the Republicans implode you just give the Democrats more cover than Jerrold Nadler’s underpants.”

What happens next was a topic of much discussion. Rep. Maria Salazar said on CNN that she thought there would be a new speaker soon. But most of the coverage on all the networks depicted a Republican majority that hadn’t yet figured out the path forward.

“What we do know is this bickering cannot continue,” Salazar said.

Oh, but it can. And there’s no indication it’ll stop anytime soon.

Reach Goodykoontz at bill.goodykoontz@arizonarepublic.com. Facebook: facebook.com/GoodyOnFilm. X, formerly known as Twitter: @goodyk.

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This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: CNN, Fox News and MSNBC's Kevin McCarthy ouster coverage was nuts