After dropping out of the race for speaker of the House, Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif). said he did not want to be a “distraction” from the committee investigating the attack on Americans in Benghazi. (AP)

Kevin McCarthy will not be the Speaker of the House.

We know that now because the California Republican has withdrawn from the race to succeed John Boehner after a private gathering of Republicans made clear that he would never be able to get a simple majority of votes for his speakership on the House floor.

The tendency in the after-action reporting on McCarthy’s stunning collapse — and, make no mistake, it is stunning — will be to pinpoint a single reason for it: whether that reason be rumors of personal problems, an inability to win over the more conservative members of his conference or his recent flub when talking about the Benghazi select committee.