Mitch Shows (Like Trump) Is NOT A "Stable Genius"

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has come up with a lot of bad ideas, but his latest may be one of his worst. Instead of appropriating money to help states and cities fight the Coronavirus pandemic, Mitch says the states should just declare bankruptcy.

That was an insane and mean-spirited statement, and it shows that McConnell is not very bright. Many states (who can't run a deficit like the federal government) declaring bankruptcy would just make an already terrible economy many times worse.

Here's some of what Jennifer Rubin had to say in The Washington Post:

There is a tendency in the mainstream media to attribute nearly unlimited political prowess to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). Certainly, his hard-line gamesmanship has worked to fill the courts (and two slots on the Supreme Court) with conservative judges. Beyond that? He failed to repeal the Affordable Care Act, and he routinely gets boxed about the ears by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), as she did again in achieving — with a strong assist from Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer — many (but not all) of Democrats’ aims in the coronavirusrelief package passed last week. McConnell’s hard line collapsed, and then he really made a mess of things.

In rejecting the plea of governors and mayors for additional funding to make up for huge expenditures and revenue shortfalls stemming from the coronavirus, McConnell made himself a target. Suggesting states go bankrupt instead only added fuel to the fire of governors. In this case, the outrage over McConnell is bipartisan, which was entirely predictable given that senators are desperate to fund fire, police and other essential services back home. (Seriously, what could McConnell have been thinking?) . . .

Predictably, McConnell’s intention to stiff state and local workers (who are at risk of getting laid off) and essential services did not go down well with his own members. CNN reports: “A number of Senate Republicans are publicly and privately expressing an openness toward a new round of funding to cash-strapped state and local governments, even as Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell floated the possibility of states declaring bankruptcy rather than receive more federal aid.” These include rock-ribbed Republicans such as Sens. Mike Braun (Ind.) and Bill Cassidy (La.), further proof that deficit hawks never object to spending on things they like. . . .

McConnell has tied himself to Trump’s mast, but on this one the president may not even agree with him. Trump apparently is open to helping the states. (Cuomo’s visit to the White House last week apparently paid off.) In any event, McConnell can read the polls — Trump is sinking, his Senate majority is at risk and he has a well-financed challenger in Amy McGrath.

Given all that it’s an odd strategy to declare you have no interest in bringing home relief to, as Pelosi describes them, “health care workers and public hospitals and the rest, police and fire, emergency services folks, first responders, our teachers, our teachers, our teachers, transit workers who enable people, the essential workers to get to work.” Perhaps McConnell has been in Washington too long and has gotten badly out of touch — even with Republicans.