Is An Obama-McConnell Meeting of the Minds An Omen for November?
Could the president be preparing for the worst less than 90 days before the November elections? At least one guy in Washington things so.
In a move that went largely unnoticed, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., met individually with President Obama on Wednesday. When asked Thursday about the Oval Office meeting, which reportedly came at the invitation of the president, McConnell implied that Obama was simply taking a first step in preparing for a much different looking Congress this November than what he has had since Jan. 20, 2009. "The president is a very smart guy, and he figures he'll be seeing a lot of me in the future," McConnell said, before adding that he looks forward to "seeing a lot more of him."
While I can appreciate the Senator's confidence, the midterm elections are still almost three months away, and the Republican Party hasn't won diddly crap yet. At the same time, though, some in the GOP are apparently already handing out cases of Rice-A-Roni, Turtle Wax, and that old Flokati rug from "Press Your Luck" to Democrats as their lovely parting gifts. It might seem that McConnell does not recognize at the moment that fortunes can change in a nanosecond when it comes to elections, lest he forget, dare I say, the 2006 "October surprise," Mark Foley.
To counter McConnell's comments, senior adviser to the president, David Axelrod, suggested the Senator was blowing smoke. He indicated that some of the purposes of the meeting were, according to a McClatchy report, "to urge that Republicans stop blocking appointments...and to explore what other issues they could agree to bring votes on in the near term." Axelrod said, "This was about trying to unstuck a process that has been stuck, at least on things that should not be a matter of controversy." He went on to state McConnell would still be the Senate Minority Leader after November 2.
Discounting the use of "unstuck" as a verb, Dave, just like Mitch McConnell, you're forgetting a key fact about your own party: that most Congressional Democrats aren't exactly winning any major popularity contests these days. While it's a little premature for Republicans to come even remotely close to claiming any victories, McConnell may have a point. A recent Rasmussen Generic Congressional Ballot showed that 46 percent of likely voters would vote for the Republican running in their district, while 38 percent said they would vote for the Democrat. Granted, this is simply a generic ballot, but consider that for the week ending Feb. 1, 2009, the first full week after Barack Obama's inauguration, Democrats held a 42 to 38 percent advantage in the same survey.
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