Washington’s perennial saga of escalating gimmickry continues Tuesday as Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) pulls the ol’ “same-day invite the President to the Capitol” trick.
Shortly after Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) canceled next week’s Independence Day recess — a bit of Kabuki in its own right — McConnell took the Senate floor to set himself up with an opportunity to criticize President Obama for rejecting an invitation to have some real talk about the debt limit in order to attend a political fundraiser.
“So let me do something that I think would be constructive,” McConnell said, likely while stifling laughter. “I’d like to invite the President to come to the Capitol today to join Republicans for lunch, or at any time this afternoon that he can make it. That way he can hear directly from Republicans why what he’s proposing won’t pass. And we can start talking about what’s actually possible.”
Anyone near the Secret Service headquarters may have heard audible groans, followed by sighs of relief, when the agents realized Obama’s lunching with the Vice President, then traveling to Philadelphia, and so won’t be able to make the trip down Pennsylvania Ave.
Late update: From the White House podium, spokesman Jay Carney declines the invitation on Obama’s behalf.
“What the senator wanted the president to do was sit down and hear the Republicans maximalist position,” Carney said. “American people are tired of the posturing–they want us to work, they want us to move outside our comfort zone…to accept terms they would normally not accept.”
