Any similarities between the following satire and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor's actual resignation speech Wednesday are totally coincidental:
My fellow Americans. My Jewish faith has been a source of comfort to me in this hour of disappointment. I learned in Hebrew School that failure often brings opportunity. I am thus going to take the opportunity of this loss to prevail upon my major campaign donors -- private equity firms and financial institutions that hold the same sacred values I do, such as one hand washes the other, or you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours -- to allow me to continue to represent those values in Washington, where they are so sorely needed -- but in the "quasi" private sector of lobbying, at a salary that will make me rich, much richer than the constituents who have voted me out of office. Great wealth may be an inadequate substitute for the great power that would have come my way in my being the next Speaker. But all things considered, it'll have to do.
I have reflected deeply these last four or five hours on what could have caused such an unexpected and disappointing loss. Some say it was inattention to the needs of my constituents, as I traveled the country fund-raising. Others think that after ingratiating myself repeatedly to the Tea Party, I lost my way and then was devoured by my own young. I think that is a scurrilous slander emanating from inside the White House, undoubtedly leading all the way to President Obama, as so much else invariably does. The Tea Party stands for many of the same values I do. It just expresses them more openly and honestly, something I was no longer able to do once I became Majority Leader and saw a Speakership on the near horizon. For in order to become Speaker, I had to sublimate my natural impulses and values, stand them on their head in some cases, and start to advocate for things, like immigration reform, I had never believed in before.
No, after hours of deep soul-searching, I have come to this conclusion: it was my failure to do nothing well enough. I came to Washington to do nothing, and I rose through the Republican ranks while doing nothing. Doing nothing became second nature to me. But in these last two years, I did in fact lose my way. I now see this. Had I done nothing, perhaps the government would still be shut down. Had I done nothing, perhaps our debt ceiling would not have been raised, thereby protecting millions of future Americans from the burdens of ever-increasing indebtedness that they, personally, will never have to pay, by allowing us to go into default as a country. Some say the fact the deficit has declined from over $1 trillion annually to well under $500 billion this year, and improving month by month, while the economy continues to improve, is a testament to the power of compromise in Washington, doing something, not nothing, to avoid a catastrophe.
Well, I ask you, what greater catastrophe could there have been than my constituents showing me the error of my ways and voting me out of office? A catastrophe that will make me rich, to be sure, but a catastrophe nevertheless, since now I will never be Speaker and demonstrate the power of doing nothing in the Highest Office as the second in line to the Presidency. So, they were right, I was wrong -- the voters are never wrong, they have the final say. I did not do nothing well enough, and I have paid the price.
My opponent, Congressman-to-be Brat, has learned this lesson well. His campaign platform is a recipe for doing nothing -- with the exception of instant deportation of 11 million illegal aliens who happen to have been in this country for as long as decades. OK, that's not nothing. But it would be subtraction, and subtraction is less than nothing, so it must be even better than nothing! In fact, to do nothing, Congressman-to-be Brat may be well-advised to not even come to Washington once elected, thus maximizing his effectiveness.
I hope my fellow Republicans learn the lesson of this primary well. We must do nothing, better. Do nothing better, we must (that sounds better.) Only by doing nothing better can we solve our many problems and restore this country to the greatness that it enjoyed in the mid-1800s, when Government was small, the country was not yet in Civil War, only productive members of society could vote, there were many fewer illegal aliens in this country, and the ones who were here had no rights anyway.
So I leave you today -- OK, not today, but later this year, I still have power and a few offers to mull over, while I still have leverage -- enlightened by my constituents and ready to face the uncertain but highly lucrative future that awaits me, by lobbying for nothing to get done in Washington. I will likely be much more successful in this task as a lobbyist than I ever was as a legislator. And the pay is much, much better. God Bless the United States of America, and also my donors, who make these dreams come true.