Cincinnati ‘s WLWT reported that while casting himself as the “change” candidate after 30 years of the same old same old, Senator Mitch McConnell (R-KY) then denied that he had ever said diddly-squat about privatizing Social Security:
When asked about that, McConnell bristled and replied “What utter nonsense.” He described it as a typical page from the Democratic Party playbook that tries to scare the seniors.
“Nobody wants to privatize Social Security,” said McConnell. “It’s such a phony allegation that it really makes you almost gag.”
Well, to be fair, the only reason this is coming up as an issue is because Mitch McConnell just bragged about it last week.
So, “nobody wants to privatize Social Security —” except for the times when McConnell did actually push to privatize Social Security. Just last week, in fact, Senator McConnell was bragging to the Louisville Rotary Club about how hard he worked to privatize Social Security in 2005.
When questioned about this, McConnell pulled a preschool move, by declaring that he wouldn’t say what the GOP agenda would be. So that was helpful. But now he’s going to “gag” over being accused of what he bragged about last week. Hmmm.
The Grimes campaign were not impressed when McConnell tried to pull this before. They called him out on his actual voting record:
In fact, Social Security has been a recurring element of McConnell’s 30-year record of failure in Washington. Back in the 1990’s, McConnell cast crucial votes in favor of early privatization schemes, and while campaigning for privatization in 2005, called the idea an “extraordinarily good investment” and the “way we can strengthen and save Social Security.”
Back in December of 2013, McConnell gunned for Social Security while threatening that the debt ceiling “deal” wouldn’t be clean. In exchange for even considering doing the bare minimum of their jobs regarding the debt ceiling, Republicans would demand ransom and they wanted “entitlement reform”. Entitlement is what Republicans call something Americans have paid into all of their lives like Social Security. But entitlement is not, in Republicanese, giving big oil more taxpayer money in an effort to subsidize them.
McConnell loved the Bush plan of “fixing” Social Security. And that is to privatize it. So it’s unclear why he’s gagging, but perhaps he shares our response to his own positions.
“Mitch McConnell’s agenda to privatize Social Security – a top priority of Mitch and his billionaire donor friends – has now come front and center in the final four days of this neck-and-neck sprint to Election Day,” said Grimes campaign manager Jonathan Hurst. “After a 30-year record of failure in Washington, Mitch McConnell has been reduced to lying directly to the voters of Kentucky about his plans to privatize Social Security in a desperate attempt to hold onto the power that has made him wealthy on the backs of ordinary Kentuckians.”
While he was at it, the Republican Senator promised to “work with” the President on issues that matter to Republicans, “McConnell pledged that as majority leader, he would work with President Barack Obama on some things like trade agreements and comprehensive tax reform.” How kind of him. How about jobs? Nope. Just the things Republicans want. This is called “working with” the President.
McConnell labeled the Republican agenda the “political center”, but the public has not been clamoring for comprehensive tax reform, unless it is to stop doing the exact thing Republicans want to do more of, and that is to subsidize big oil and major corporations’ losses, while privatizing the gains.
McConnell is also going to scrap Kynect, so Kentuckians should be ready to say goodbye to their Obamacare. (Yes, that’s the insurance y’all thought was so much better than Ocare. Sorry.) Good times ahead for Big Oil and Big Corporations should McConnell win and the Republicans take the majority in the Senate, which they will do unless Democrats and sane, informed people turn out to vote.
Republicans have been dropping rather large clues for oh, almost since its inception, that they want to privatize Social Security. This is not news. Many Republican Senate candidates opened their mouths and said too much about the GOP agenda to privatize Social Security. Joni Ernst in Iowa told the public, “Yes. I have talked about privatizing Social Security.” Oops. Not supposed to say that out loud, but she’s new. Cut her a break. Scott Brown, speaking from whatever state he is currently calling home, likes to suggest that Social Security needs to be cut, even though Ronald Reagan tried to explain to Republicans that Social Security has nothing to do with the deficit.
Mitch McConnell knows he can’t win his Senate seat in Kentucky if he tells the truth about his big money agenda. But sometimes he slips up, just like the newer candidates, and out comes the privatization talk that Republicans know kills campaigns. So now Mitch McConnell is pretending it makes him gag to have anyone suggest he’s ever said what he’s spent years trying to achieve.
Makes you wonder why McConnell is so ashamed of his party’s agenda. If it’s so great, why not be honest about it?
Sarah has been credentialed to cover President Barack Obama, then VP Joe Biden, 2016 Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, and exclusively interviewed Speaker Nancy Pelosi multiple times and exclusively covered her first home appearance after the first impeachment of then President Donald Trump.
Sarah is two-time Telly award winning video producer and a member of the Society of Professional Journalists.
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