What Drives Mitch McConnell? A Conscienceless, Near-Cartoonish Pursuit of Power

by Thomas Neuburger

For all the damage he’s inflicted on American democracy, for all the political corpses he’s left in his wake, Mitch McConnell has never betrayed an ounce of shame.
—Robert Moser, Rolling Stone

Mitch McConnell is a unique individual in the modern political world.

Most politicians are filled with a mix of fevered desires, flattering self-projections, a bittersweet mashup of idealistic regret and sad bows to "practicality," naked ego and the many attractive perks of the "Oh It's You, Senator" club (search on "you get it all the time") — and especially lots and lots of money. (I must add though that their vast corruption is vastly under-compensated, a point I've many times; the money-corrupted among them need a much better agent.)

It's a rare politician who simply wants power and power alone, power for its own sake, power unalloyed by other human desires. Mitch McConnell, like Rupert Murdoch and the real Mayor Daley (Richard J.) before him, is such a man.

At least that's the assessment of Dan Froomkin, writing at his site Press Watch:

Three things the media should be telling you about Mitch McConnell

McConnell’s motivations are essential context for a public trying to understand what’s going on in the Senate – and specifically, why McConnell is blocking Democratic attempts to introduce evidence that wasn’t available to the House.

The good news is that Mitch McConnell is not a hard guy to figure out. Indeed, countless, extensive profiles of him have concluded the same thing: that he is singularly uncomplicated. His only ideology is power. ...

[T]here is no appealing to reason with Mitch McConnell. There is no appealing to precedent, or to a sense of history. There is no appealing to the separation of powers, the role of Congress, or the sanctity of the Senate. There is certainly no appealing to the idea of country or the Constitution over party.

If it doesn’t help Republicans get elected, he’s not interested.

Here are three of the things reporters know about McConnell, but routinely fail to tell their readers and viewers...

Those three things are these:

1. Since money in politics is the chief agent of corruption, and Republican corruption means the acquisition of power for its own sake — what ever you think of Democrats, and I don't think much of them these days, Republicans aren't called "authoritarian" and "fascist" for no reason — "the only issue that McConnell really cares about is opposing any limits to money in politics."

Quoting Alex Parene:

Mitch McConnell is the great avatar of the decades-long enclosure of our public life by money. He does not offer a stirring vision of conservative national greatness or even ends-justify-the-means rationales for Senate horse-trading ... In Mitchworld, you simply pay—and pay, and pay—to play.

And:

Being a Senate majority leader who doesn’t care about almost any particular outcome to any particular political issue not directly related to making sure your funders can fund you actually seems to take quite a bit of pressure off, job performance–wise.

A simple, uncomplicated life. When you want exactly and only one thing, distraction is never an issue.

2. McConnell has "ruined the Senate," and that's just fine with him.

As Froomkin writes, "McConnell has dramatically transformed the U.S. Senate, from a place that once relied heavily on tradition and precedent and was less partisan and more deliberative than the House, into a slaughterhouse for any legislation that might hurt his donor pool."

But that's just one way he's damaged the body he's part of. The other way is to empower a radical judiciary that is more and more taking power away from the legislature, including the Senate, and arrogating to itself decisions the Founders meant the people to decide.

According to Charles Homans, "In the coming years, battles over voting rights, health care, abortion, regulation and campaign finance, among other areas, are less likely to be decided in Congress than in the nation’s courthouses. In effect, McConnell has become a master of the Senate by figuring out how to route the Republican agenda around it."

Using the Senate to diminish the Senate — that's our Mitch.

3. The simplicity of his wickedness renders him almost cartoonish.

Robert Moser (also quoted above), writes of McConnell, "like the president he now so faithfully serves, McConnell has always exuded a sense of pride in the lengths to which he’s gone to achieve his ambitions and infuriate his enemies."

And James Zengerle noted in Politico, "While most politicians desperately want to be liked, McConnell has relished—and cultivated—his reputation as a villain. After all, he achieved his iron-fisted grip on the politics of his home state and his fractious party on Capitol Hill through discipline, cunning and, oftentimes, fear. ... [A]t the moments that have found him happiest—winning elections, blocking bills, denying the sheen of bipartisanship to President Barack Obama—he has radiated not joy but menace."

Yet as amusing as cartoon villainy is to contemplate, this last point should not be dwelt on.

McConnell may well be the most dangerous man in politics today, not just because of his terrible goals — the acquisition of total power for a party that hosts the worse authoritarians in the country — but also because not an ounce of conscience pulls him back from the brink of his most terrible deeds.

He not only fails to fear that brink; he relishes finding it.

If I could choose just two politicians to remove immediately and forever from office, from a list that includes such dark angels as Boris Johnson, Jair Bolsonaro, Donald Trump, Benjamin Netanyahu, the murderous Mohammed bin Salman, our own progressive-hating Chuck Schumer and his House counterpart (yes, even her) and many more like them — I just might choose to eliminate Mitch McConnell. Twice.