McConnell warns default could ‘destroy’ GOP brand

McConnell warns default could ‘destroy’ GOP brand
By Felicia Sonmez

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) warned Wednesday that a default on the nation’s debt would not only be dangerous for the country, but could also have damaging political repercussions for the Republican Party.

Ahead of the latest meeting between congressional leaders and the White House on Wednesday, however, Republicans appeared to be of two minds when it came to McConnell’s proposed “back-up plan” for raising the county’s debt limit.

“(Democrats) want to blame the economy on us and the reason default is no better an idea today than when Newt Gingrich tried it in 1995 is that it destroys your brand. It would give the president an opportunity to blame Republicans for a bad economy,” McConnell told conservative commentator Laura Ingraham in a Wednesday morning radio interview. “Look, he owns the economy. He’s been in office almost three years now, and we refuse to let him entice us into co-ownership of a bad economy.”

McConnell said that while his “first choice was to do something important for the country” in drafting a back-up plan, he also believed that default could devastate the Republican Party politically, “just like we knew shutting down the government in 1995 was not going to work for us; it helped Bill Clinton get re-elected.”

“I refuse to help Barack Obama get re-elected by marching Republicans into a position where we have co-ownership of a bad economy. ... If we go into default, he will say that Republicans are making the economy worse and try to convince the public -- maybe with some merit, if people stop getting their Social Security checks and military families start getting letters saying servicepeople overseas don’t get paid. It’s an argument he could have a good chance of winning, and all of the sudden we have co-ownership of a bad economy,” he said. “That is very bad positioning going into an election.”

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/2chambers/post/mcconnell-warns-default-could-destroy-gop-brand/2011/07/13/gIQAPZTwCI_blog.html

all they care about is their precious GOP and power.

Just like they knew it with Bill Clinton. They aren't really going after the White House in earnest
unless they see an opening.

What they are after is to make a fake grab for the White House while making a real grab for the Senate,
hoping we are so pre-occupied with the presidential race that we take our eye off the fight for control
of the Senate. If we lose the Senate, the White House, while important for the Supreme Court alone, will
lose a lot of its clout. Clinton showed he could survive a full Republican onslaught, but the current
group of Republicans in Congress makes the ones Clinton faced look like the Massachusetts State Legislature.

It would be bad for the republican party.

Sounds like this POS has his priorities a bit out of order.

You marched us all into a bad economy. He's trying to march us back out.

I realize that such a concept may be just a bit too much for you to grasp, but there it is..............

The teapartiers who got elected in 2010, some rode in on their coattails..but most could care less about the Republican party. They could care less about the United States of America.

They have a wild hair about that black man sitting in the white house.. and they will take down the country to try and shake him out.

George W. Bush.

Lou

The baggers are a a schism that will split the party.

No party lasts forever in this country. Let them die. We'll clean up like we always do.

The teabaggers don't understand the implications.

I'm not stopping them.

Gee Mitch, what a shame.

And therefore cannot and WILL not do something important for the country.

That is all you need to know.

Party before country.....why do folks even vote for this kind of man?

And if they somehow think that this will wash over well to the masses....to cowardly and shallowly refuse to do their jobs that they were hired to do - you know - to actually govern - they are sorely mistaken.

Huge mistake on the part of the GOP.
They have guarenteed Obama's win in 2012 - and that is a good thing. Even better, if the economy improves, they will be shut out of 2016 as well.

It seems that this turns on you.

while Democrats stayed home.

They created the mess, they've worked overtime not to fix it but to prevent any attempt to fix it, and they're trying to suggest that they don't have ownership of the bad economy? Is the population so dumb and inattentive or possessed of such short memories that they'll buy that idea?

Judging by 2010 results.

I laughed at that line as well.

Typical GOP. Job 1 is defeating Obama and the Dems and not doing anything for the good of the country or its citizens.

of raising the debt ceiling.

I guess he missed all that polling that says that MORE people blame Bush/GOP for the rotten economy. They already OWN it! :puke:

I could give a fuck about the economy or the American people!"