bryant

Rep. Boehner was elected House majority leader. This is kind of the most amusing outcome; it's both a validation of the assertion that the Republican members of the House were too corrupt and a demonstration that the right-wing blogs aren't much more effective than the left-wing blogs when it comes to Capitol Hill.

Intriguingly, Shadegg dropped out after the first ballot, throwing his support to Boehner. Thanks for campaigning for him, bloggers: looks like he was basically playing kingmaker rather than really running. You could view that as a win in that he'll have a chunk of influence, I suppose.

Boehner is the guy who handed out campaign checks from the tobacco industry on the House floor in 1995. I'm sure he's gotten a lot more serious about reform since then, of course. He's only got... 14 former staffers working as lobbyists, which is almost three times as many as both Blunt and Shadegg combined.