Say what?
That quote comes around the 7:25 mark, but this is worth watching in full. McConnell actually started off OK in this interview. He pointed out that when the White House extended the Bush tax cuts in December, part of their rationale for doing so was that they didn’t want to raise taxes in the middle of a recession. So McConnell asks how can Obama insist on raising taxes now as part of the debt ceiling deal, when the economy is by most accounts even worse off? And why would he expect Republicans to agree to that?
Furthermore, he says, over the past two and a half years, we’ve seen the federal government effectively take over the banking, insurance, automobile, student loan, and health care industries – and they’re not done yet. Discretionary spending and deficits have skyrocketed on Obama’s watch, and McConnell worries that any deal the Republicans agree to might risk locking in big government into perpetuity.
But here’s the thing. It doesn’t sound like McConnell is even contemplating the possibility that there might not be a deal at all, as if that would be unthinkable. He said he’s for “the biggest deal possible without raising taxes.” Which prompted Bret Baier asked: “What if there isn’t a deal?”
McConnell literally froze solid for two full seconds. Translation: The thought has never entered his mind.
He then, incredibly, claimed that “nobody’s talking about not raising the debt ceiling…not in Congress.”
So here’s what Obama can take away from this interview, if McConnell is to be believed:
1) The debt ceiling will be raised no matter what, and
2) There will be a deal of some kind.
Pathetic. As a negotiator, McConnell is not exactly inspiring confidence here.
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