Bishop and Norman’s show is good entertainment, but poorly managed | WFAE 90.7

Who says the government can’t do things? Republicans in Congress have turned the election for the speaker of the House of Representatives into a middle-school drama that’s as awkward as it is hilarious.

For days, C-SPAN was the funniest channel on TV. Towards the end, Mike Rodgers of Alabama pounced on Matt Gates of Florida, and Richard Hudson of North Carolina had to stop him. Friday night at the House turned into Friday night at the Waffle House.

Finally, at 15^day Vote, Kevin McCarthy received enough votes to become speaker. But he can be difficult to manage because he’s getting more rejected calls than the ones shown on the screen as a spam risk.

I don’t have much sympathy for McCarthy. But with the 20 or so Republican House members who spent five days adjusting the gears of the process, I have even less of an opinion. I don’t trust them to wash cars, let alone Congress.

It so happened that two of them were locals.

Ralph Norman of Rock Hill represents a large swath of north-central South Carolina. Dan Bishop of Charlotte represents a portion of southeastern Mecklenburg that extends almost as far as Winston-Salem. Norman and Bishop share some state boundaries. Their ideologies are also interconnected.

Bishop is perhaps best known for his tenure as a state legislator, as the primary driving force behind what North Carolinians remember as the “toilet bill.” The bill, signed into law by Charlotte’s Pat McCrory, compels transgender people to use the bathroom of the gender listed on their birth certificate. It led to huge backlash, including the NBA pulling the All-Star Game from Charlotte, and the legislature eventually repealed and replaced the bill. So, yes, Dan Bishop wins big.

Ralph Norman is perhaps best known for drawing a loaded pistol and placing it on the table while discussing gun safety with voters. Or you might know him as the guy who joked about Ruth Bader Ginsburg being groped by Abraham Lincoln during the Brett Kavanaugh Supreme Court hearings. A true class act.

Bishop and Norman ended up voting for McCarthy, but that put them in 12th place^day Vote to do it.

The hardcore group got some concessions from McCarthy, but I don’t think there’s any high principle behind it all. It would be understandable if this was an original Game of Thrones. But to me, it’s like a long pout.

Bishop and Norman and their friends can’t stand that they are the loser in their own party. They’re so crazy, some of them are attacking Donald Trump, the genie who has kept most of their careers alive. They can’t stand that Republicans have to work with Democrats to get anything done. So they stomp and poke their jaws like kids whose mom is about to drag them out of the store.

It was fun to watch for a while, and so was this. But at some point, the kids grow up. When it comes to Ralph Norman and Dan Bishop, I wouldn’t count on it.

Tommy Tomlinson’s On My Mind column is published every Monday at WFAE and WFAE.org. Represent my own opinion, not WFAE opinion. You can reply to this column in the comments section below. You can also email Tommy ttomlinson@wfae.org.