'A disaster for House Republicans' as Kevin McCarthy's latest gambit crashes and burns

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy's latest bid to get House Republicans to fulfill a basic obligation of a governing party has failed.

On Thursday morning, the House held a vote to simply begin debate on a spending bill that would fund the United States military.

Despite the fact that the motion would have merely opened debate rather than passed the measure, it nonetheless failed by a vote of 212 in favor to 216 opposed.

"This is a disaster for House Republicans," commented Punchbowl News' Jake Sherman on Twitter after it became clear that the measure appeared headed for defeat.

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In a followup post, Sherman explained just why McCarthy's inability to get his caucus to move on this issue was so stunning.

"Just to put this in context, Republicans cannot even agree to debate the Pentagon spending bill," Sherman wrote. "This bill usually passes by big margins. It failed twice this week. Kevin McCarthy's House Republicans are in a state of crisis."

McCarthy currently has just ten days to avert a government shutdown and so far he can't even get his party to pass bills to fund the United States military.

McCarthy could in theory try to pass a bipartisan deal to keep the government open, but that would almost certainly lead to GOP hardliners voting to oust him from the speakership.