In reporting on John Boehner’s reelection as speaker, the Wall Street Journal uses some curious language when it notes that House Majority Leader Eric Cantor of Virginia and Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy of California joined “149 other GOP rebels” to vote against the fiscal tax bill that passed on New Year’s Day. Rebels?
One hundred fifty-one House Republicans voted against the bill, 85 voted for it. Wouldn’t the latter be more properly called rebels, given that they rejected the position held by a vast majority of their Republican colleagues? That of course would make the re-elected Speaker their real rebel here.
