THEY ONLY HEAR WHAT THEY WANT TO HEAR…

It was during a recent appearance CNN's "State of the Union" that Mitch McConnell said in an interview that he thinks the American people had two messages for those in Washington in the November election.  He said, "They were certainly upset with the president and wanted to express that opposition to what he's been doing, but they also want to do something about the dysfunction in Washington. They -- I'm not sure they know exactly who is responsible for it, but they want it to stop.”  So far I’m with him.

But then he said something that caused me some concern.  He said, "And so I think the message from the American people is they'd like to see a right-of-center, responsible conservative governing majority. That's what the speaker and I tend to provide. And, hopefully, we will have enough followers to do that."  Personally, I think what many were saying this past November was that they want to see action that is more to the right than to the center, and if he insists upon being ‘moderate’ then his majority will be short lived.

McConnell also claimed that his top goal as majority leader is to do something about jobs and the economy.  He said, "Just to give you some examples, it won't surprise you, things like approving the Keystone pipeline, which would put a lot of people to work almost immediately; trying to do everything we can to push back against this overactive bureaucracy of the current administration that's created much job loss, for example, in my state, in the mining industry, coal mining industry."

McConnell also mentioned the EPA's intention to expand its regulation of the nation's waters.  He said, "We need to do everything we can to try to rein in the regulatory onslaught, which is the principal reason that we haven't had the kind of bounce-back after the 2008 recession that you would expect." McConnell also described Obamacare as a "terrible piece of legislation," but he wouldn't commit to work toward repealing it. The other option is to "take out pieces of it," he said, such as the medical device tax, the individual mandate and restoring the 40-hour work week.

He went on to say, "All of these are highly unpopular with the American people. And we will be voting on things I know he's not going to like. And I hope we can put them on his desk."  For him to make such a comment does not instill much confidence that much of anything important will be put before Barry for his signature.  Personally, I’m thinking that McConnell had better do much more than to simply hope he can get thing onto to Barry’s desk.  He prides himself on being a leader, so it’s time for old Mitch to lead!

And when he was asked how it is, exactly, that he plans to please conservatives while at the same time working to ‘broaden’ the supposed base of the Republican Party ahead of the 2016 presidential election, McConnell said, "We need to do both.”  Adding, "We need to both look for areas where we can make some progress for the country, and obviously to do that, we're going to need some Democratic senators because we need 54, not 60 and we're going to need the president of the United States.”

He said, "There are other areas where we're not going to agree. What I hope Senate Republicans will present to the country is a conservative right-of-center governing majority, serious people elected in serious times to try to get results."  And yet, McConnell had a rather unusual admonition for the new Republican majority as it takes over the Senate this week: Don’t be ‘scary.’”... Scary?  I’d like to take this opportunity to remind him that if it wasn’t for us scary folks on the right, there’d be no Republican majority.

Democrats remain dubious of McConnell’s pledge to avert edge-of-the-cliff moments. They believe he will run into the same problems that have plagued John Boehner during the past four years, including the inability to corral those they view as being the rabble-rousers, such as Ted Cruz, in order to support an agenda that conservative critics will probably view as not bold enough in challenging Barry. Appeasing those far-right conservatives will lead to an agenda that Democrats will hope to exploit in 2016.

And at the same time, those of us who reside outside the beltway are more than a little dubious that either McConnell or Boehner will spend any amount of time actually listening to those of us who made their new majority status possible.  And it’s at the risk of sounding like a proverbial broken record that I feel compelled to offer yet again, and as sternly as I can, a warning that if we who voted for Republicans in this last election feel like we are being ignored, there will be dire consequences to follow come 2016.