McConnell boldly refuses to take stance on government shutdown

Brave Sir Mitch.

Brave Sir Mitch.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is in a bind. He's supposed to be the leader of his caucus in the world's greatest deliberative body, and thus supposedly has a responsibility to the party (and to the country and good governing and all that stuff that Republicans gave up on when the Kenyan Muslim was elected president). On the other hand, he wants to keep being leader of his party in the Senate, and to do so he has to win re-election. The first step in that is beating his teabagger, shut-er-down primary opponent.

So he's stuck in a big way right now. Because when it comes to things like government shutdowns, McConnell kind of should maybe be leading. Or not.

Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has refused to publicly take a side as some members of his party lobby for shutting down the federal government.

"The problem is the bill that would shut down the government wouldn't shut down Obamacare," McConnell said. "Most of it is permanent law and not affected by that. It also wouldn't stop the taxes. Taxes that are going in on medical devices, taxes that are going in on health insurance premiums." [...]

During the meeting, McConnell told audience members, "I'm for stopping Obamacare, but shutting down the government will not stop Obamacare."

Does that mean McConnell is against shutting down government, since he admits it wouldn't work? Of course not! His staff reaffirmed to Greg Sargent that his remarks were not intended to indicate that he had taken sides in the debate raging in his party.

Leadership!