Franklin Foer argues that youthful vigor is no match for hard-won experience.
Congressman Kevin McCarthy’s failure this week to win the vote to succeed Nancy Pelosi as speaker of the House has only driven home the immense sway she held in the position. As our staff writer Franklin Foer writes, her stepping down from the role marks the twilight of the Democrats’ “ruling troika” of elders, which also includes Senator Chuck Schumer and President Joe Biden. Although critics deride this so-called gerontocracy in government, Frank predicts we’ll soon miss it. I called him to find out more.
This may be a simplistic bifurcation, but I think that there’s almost a divide in the way that people ponder the meaning of their own lives and what they hope to extract from it. And I think it’s something that probably translates into the world outside of politics.
But, you know, my guess is also that Hakeem Jeffries has been part of Pelosi’s leadership crew for a bit now, and I think that he’s probably studied her as he’s prepared to take on this job, which people knew for a while that he was going to assume.
