Colin Powell? Allen West? See Who Else Got Votes During House Speaker Election

As we predicted earlier today, Rep. John Boehner (R-OH) has won reelection to the office of Speaker of the House of Representatives. With only about 15 defectors from both parties, Boehner cruised to victory  even as some members of Congress failed to vote, throwing a serious monkey wrench into earlier speculation that Boehner was on his way out. In fact, a previous lowball estimation of "at least 20" members voting against Boehner itself proved to wildly over-optimistic about chances of unseating the Speaker.

That's not to say that the few Republican defectors who did vote against Boehner didn't make enlightening choices about who they'd like to see replace the leader. Below are the top five alternate Republican choices for Speaker, ranked by vote total and/or notability.

#5. Former Comptroller General David Walker - 1 vote

David Walker (Photo Credit: AP)

#4. Colin Powell - 1 vote

Colin Powell (Photo Credit: AP)

#3. Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), Chairman of the Republican Study Committee

Jim Jordan (Photo Credit: AP)

#2. Former Rep. Allen West (R-FL) - 2 Votes

Allen West (Photo Credit: AP)

#1. House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) - 3 Votes

Eric Cantor (Photo Credit: AP)

An interesting post-script should be noted: The only two voting members of the House of Representatives on this list (Cantor and Jordan) both voted for Boehner.