Mitch McConnell is a political opportunist, a hypocrite and a liar. These personal traits when held by someone in power can be dangerous. Senator Mitch McConnell, Majority Leader in the United States Senate is one of the most powerful people in the world. I’d say that qualifies.
I know this character reference may seem hyperbolic but it has the added quality of being true.
You see for the past seven years Senator McConnell has engaged in a long term strategy intended to diminish the constitutional authority of the President of the United States while securing his personal position of power in the most important deliberative body in the world. A historic power grab that came to full fruition last night. All orchestrated under the guise of doing what is best for the American people.
When President Trump nominated federal appellate judge Neil Gorsuch to fill departed Antonin Scalia’s seat on the US Supreme Court it marked the culmination of McConnell’s six year crusade to obstruct and delegitimize the presidency of Barak Obama.
McConnell’s quest began in 2009 when McConnell vowed to do everything he could to make Barak Obama a one term president. That goal failed when Obama won a second term. But McConnell is nothing if not persistent. Through the use of obstructionist tactics, procedural stalls and outright lies McConnell worked tirelessly behind the scenes to block Obama’s agenda at every turn.
When Trump opined that Obama was not born in this country and therefore an illegitimate president, McConnell knew it wasn’t true and could have killed the notion with a simple public statement. Yet he remained silent and let the lie simmer.
When Ted Cruz orchestrated the costly government shutdown; a move that not only damaged his party but hurt hundreds of thousands of Americans, McConnell could have ended the carnage before it began. But McConnell remained silent for nineteen days allowing the president to shoulder some of the blame. When his fellow Republicans finally begged him to step in and end the political disaster McConnell agreed to broker a deal…but only after securing a sweetheart earmark for his home state. The country suffered and his party suffered. But the president took a political hit; which was all that mattered to McConnell.
McConnell was so disciplined in his obstructionist tactics that even policy moves that his party favored were shut down rather than give Obama any hint of a political win.
McConnell’s big move came upon the death of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia.
When Scalia passed the Supreme Court was equally divided with 4 conservative justices, 4 liberal justices and Justice Kennedy the moderate swing vote in the middle. Scalia’s death meant that Obama as the sitting President could appoint a liberal leaning replacement and alter the balance for decades to come.
Scalia was not dead 24 hours when McConnell stunningly announced that the Senate would not hold a hearing on ANY replacement that Obama nominated…period. McConnell would leave the seat vacant rather than allow Obama to exercise his constitutionally granted authority. McConnell’s reasoning…that Obama was in the last months of his presidency and the country was embroiled in a contentious general election. “The people should get to decide who the next Supreme Court Justice is and they will do that with their vote in the upcoming election.”
Obama still had ten months remaining in his second term. Justice Kennedy was nominated and confirmed during President Reagan’s last year in office. None of that mattered to McConnell: “Advice and consent means he gets to send the nomination up. We get to decide whether to act on it. People get to choose to meet or not meet as they see fit. This nominee is not going to be considered.”
President Obama played his card. He nominated a fairly moderate jurist in Merrick Garland who had been confirmed by the senate for his federal judgeship by a 99-0 vote.
McConnell didn’t budge. He gambled that a Republican would win the White House and the balance of power on the Court would shift to McConnell’s conservative side of the aisle. And if it didn’t work out as planned and Clinton won, he still had the satisfaction of keeping Obama from getting credit for a historic appointment. Even if it meant violating the constitution in the process. One last obstructionist move. One last slap at the legitimacy of the Obama presidency.
Last night newly elected Republican President Donald Trump named highly qualified, extremely conservative appellate court judge Neil Gorsuch as his nominee for the Supreme Court. McConnell’s gamble had paid off. He won. And now he was singing a much different tune.
When Democrats threatened to use McConnell’s own tactics to block Gorsuch confirmation, McConnell looked hypocrisy in the eye and didn’t blink. McConnell lashed out: ‘Apparently there’s a new standard now which is not to confirm a new Supreme Court nominee at all! I think that is something that the American people will not tolerate. We’ll be looking forward to receiving a Supreme Court nomination and moving forward on it. We hope that our Democratic friends will treat President Trump’s nominees the same way that we treated Clinton and Obama’s first term nominees.”
Hypocrisy does not phase Mitch McConnell. He has turned hypocrisy into an art form. Neither does lying…obstructing…violating the constitution…or sabotaging the authority of the duly elected President of the United States. All fair game in McConnell’s political world.
Mitch McConnell is a political opportunist, a hypocrite and a liar.
He is also very good at his job.
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