Kevin McCarthy

George Skelton, Tribune News Service

Winston Churchill warned, “You cannot reason with a tiger when your head is in its mouth.” Ousted U.S. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy should have listened.

That’s apparently what Churchill said, anyway. We do know for certain that actor Gary Oldman, playing the British leader, said it forcefully in the movie “Darkest Hour.” Churchill was incredulous that anyone would consider negotiating with Adolf Hitler.

McCarthy’s tiger that gobbled him up was a political animal hungry for attention, Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., supported by a small band of hard-right Republican mutineers. They complained that the GOP speaker reached across the aisle too often and dealt with the opposition party — you know, like the founders envisioned when they created our democratic form of government.

We’re built for bipartisan compromise in this country or little that’s important gets done in government — at least when the two sides are closely matched as they have been in Washington in recent years.

“I don’t regret standing up for choosing governance over grievance,” McCarthy, R-Calif., told reporters immediately after being dumped last week. “Our government is designed to find compromise. I don’t regret my efforts to build coalitions and find solutions. I was raised to solve problems, not create them.” This sounded like the McCarthy that Sacramento pols remember from 20 years ago — the widely respected, pragmatic, moderate young minority leader of the California state Assembly. Many have wondered whatever happened to that guy because the Washington McCarthy seems to have little resemblance.

But let’s be realistic. Sacramento also has little resemblance to Washington, especially these days. More on that below.

McCarthy stuck his head in the tiger’s mouth when he agreed to accept House rules that proved fatal. This was his price for securing enough right-wing votes to be elected speaker in January.

One particularly lethal rule allowed just a single House member to call for a vote to boot the speaker. Gaetz had insisted on the one-vote rule and ultimately used it to devour McCarthy.

There’s another Churchill quote that’s relevant to McCarthy’s downfall. The statesman said: “An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile hoping it will eat him last.” McCarthy made concession after concession in a desperate effort to appease GOP hard-liners and save his speakership. He fed the crocodile a steady diet of Democrats before getting eaten himself.

In the end, 208 Democrats joined eight Republicans — fewer than 4% of the GOP membership — in chomping down on McCarthy.

Would Democrats have saved McCarthy if he hadn’t taken such cheap shots at them? Placating hard-liners, McCarthy launched a frivolous impeachment inquiry against President Joe Biden. And bowing to MAGA Republicans, the speaker allowed a rare House censure of Rep. Adam B. Schiff, D-Calif., for his role in trying to uncover alleged collusion between former President Donald Trump and Russia. Schiff also had led the first impeachment prosecution against Trump. Schiff and other Democrats were knocked off committees. On the good government side, McCarthy compromised with Biden and Democrats twice to prevent the U.S. from defaulting on its debt and to keep government doors open. That’s what irked the GOP renegades.

On balance, didn’t McCarthy deserve to be spared by Democrats? “You can’t blame Democrats for voting against McCarthy,” says Jim Brulte, a former California state Republican chairman and GOP leader in both legislative houses. “When you’re in the minority and the majority is going to war against itself, you sit back and let them do it.” Yes, that’s politics. If you’re given a chance to make the other side look inept and stupid, you seize it.

But longtime Democratic Assembly Speaker Willie Brown, who later became mayor of San Francisco, told me that Democrats “should have been fighting on behalf of McCarthy against those right-wing crazy people” because his successor is bound to be worse.