Republicans fight over speaker of the House – but whoever wins, the party loses | Robert Reich

The Republican party has collapsed under its own contradictions, competing impulses and fear of the base

On Tuesday, as Republicans in the US House of Representatives convulse over electing one among them as speaker of the House, with Kevin McCarthy attempting to outmanoeuvre his hardcore Maga detractors, the civil war in the Republican party comes into the open.

But it's not particularly civil and it's not exactly a war. It's the mindless hostility of a political party that's lost any legitimate reason for being.