Justin Amash as principled compromise Speaker? OR instead, Justin Amash, Just.Another.Politician.™?

Sounds good, right, that the former Michigan Congresscritter, former Republican now Libertarian, would offer himself up as a compromise, one-term Speaker of the House?

Ain't happening, and Amash should know better.

The "defectors" wouldn't surrender to him. His promise to run a putatively Constitutional House operations would probably make some of them think their plans to investigate anybody with a D last initial would be grounded.

Beyond that, the defectors have nominated, or voted for, nearly half a dozen candidates. And, Amash's offer was aired with Reason before the end of the day Wednesday. The defectors pointedly did not take up his offer.

That said, nobody really knows what the defectors DO want. McCarthy pretty much cut off what was left of his own balls when he agreed that his Speaker's PAC wouldn't intervene in safe states primaries, and not a single defector left the flock. They haven't gained anybody since Donalds on the third round of voting. (I have no idea why Spartz continues to vote "present," and I think nobody else knows what she's doing, either.)

At the same time, because nobody knows what the defectors want, they haven't added anybody since Donalds in the third round of voting.

Beyond that, Amash's idea for diminishing the Speaker's power bucks 200 years and more of House history going back to Henry Clay.

Side note: To non-Mises type Libertarians like George Phillies of Independent Political Report, is Amash really a true Libertarian? This non-Libertarian leftist said he isn't, at the time he said he was leaving the GOP. That post of mine ties us back to the start of all of this, though. Amash, as noted there, was one of the founders of the FreeDumb Caucus. He should know that it's unlikely the defectors would surrender to him. And, per both that and the Reason piece, he's attacked McCarthy before he does there, and what passes for a GOP "mainstream" agreed with Trumpists on backing Peter Meijer's challenge to Amash. 

Verdict?

Amash is trying to keep his face in the news for 2024.