You are in error about lame ducks. Members-elect come to DC and participate in the leadership elections and in the nomination of the Speaker and Committee chairs, and outgoing members do not vote (not sure if they can attend the meetings or not).
You are correct in theory that if the members-elect and returning members were to take over the Republican conference and nominate a very aggressive MAGA candidates for Speaker and reject seniority to nominate junior MAGA members for key Chairmanships, that the moderate Republicans could team up with the Democrats to elect a moderate Republican to those posts, in defiance of the conference. However, that’s really unlikely on both sides.
You should be FAR more worried about how the Swamp subverts people who come to Congress pure-in-heart small government conservatives...
OK
Your first paragraph has given me a lot to chew on. Obviously I’m gonna have to do more digging on that.