On CNN's "State of the Union" Sunday, McConnell objected to the idea that the federal government should provide the funds to keep cops, firefighters and teachers on the job.

"They are local and state employees," McConnell said. "The question is whether the federal government can afford to be bailing out states. I think the answer is no." He went on to whine, "Their story line is that there must be some villain out there who’s keeping this administration from succeeding."

On his West Coast tour Obama is hitting McConnell directly, and he's picked a great target. In Las Vegas yesterday, and again in San Francisco, he mocked McConnell for calling the effort to keep first responders on the job "a bailout," as though they were irresponsible Wall Street banking firms that got taxpayer support. "These aren't bad actors who somehow screwed up the economy. They didn't act irresponsibly. These are the men and women who teach our children, who patrol our streets, who run into burning buildings and save people. They deserve our support."

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On Wednesday, McConnell gave an interview to conservative radio host Laura Ingraham. The New York Times summarizes:

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Here's what we know, from the Associated Press:

At a Capitol news conference little over an hour before the latest round of negotiations was set to begin at the White House, McConnell described a plan that would allow the debt ceiling to be raised in three separate stages through the end of next year, for a total of $2.5 trillion. The plan would place the political burden of raising the debt limit on President Obama and congressional Democrats, rather than on Republicans.

On each of these three occasions, Obama would request a raise in the debt ceiling and propose offsetting spending cuts. Congress would then get to vote to approve or disapprove the president's proposal.

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So here's a little translation guide to help readers get some clarity.

What they say:

Michele Bachmann, explaining the only circumstances under which she would vote for raising the debt ceiling.

"They'd have to cut an enormous amount, including they would have to defund Obamacare," she said on Fox News in response to a question about the circumstances under which she'd vote to raise the debt ceiling. "Because that's the largest entitlement in the history of the country."

What she means:

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"These are not American citizens. We just found with the Caylee Anthony case how difficult it is to get a conviction in a U.S. court," McConnell told "Fox News Sunday." "I don't think a foreigner is entitled to all the protection in the Bill of Rights. They should not be in U.S. courts and before military commissions."

Thanks to the minority leader for demonstrating exactly why so many people couldn't figure out that my jokes about Republicans responding to the Casey Anthony verdict were meant to be... jokes. I should know by now that there is no joking when it comes to the shamelessness and venality of these guys.

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It was previously thought that Harry Reid would simply block a vote on repeal and that would be the end of it, but Minority Leader Mitch McConnell always finds a way. He could use "Rule 14" to bring it to the floor, for example. Or -- and this is what he'll probably do -- he could attach repeal as an amendment to something likely to pass the Senate.

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The running back said he felt wonderful, tremendous, joyful. So why the public cry? Relief, strong emotions after a lot of tough times for him and the team, and ... well, why not?

After all, Rep. John Boehner, who lives just north of Cincinnati, wept on national TV the night Republican election victories assured he will be the nation's next speaker of the House. And from the neighboring state to the south, Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., choked up as he bid farewell this month to a retiring colleague.

Just a few examples of well-known males turning on the waterworks in a Year of the Tear, four decades after Marvin Gaye sang that "I know a man ain't supposed to cry" and a Democratic presidential contender's campaign foundered under the weight of reports he teared up.

Maine Sen. Edmund Muskie had plans that morning in 1972 to call out the publisher of the Manchester (N.H.) Union Leader over criticism of his wife. But reports that he had tears in his eyes -- which Muskie went to his grave insisting were melted snowflakes -- raised questions about whether he could handle crises or stare down the Russians.

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Thune just made a classic unforced error, by requesting earmarks in the omnibus spending bill (wasteful government spending!) despite voting to voluntarily ban earmarks. He made things worse when he was utterly unable to square his requests with his opposition to the bill.

Orrin Hatch embarrassed him further, when Hatch voluntarily withdrew his earmark requests from the bill entirely, because, well, he did just vote for that earmark moratorium. Why didn't Thune do the same? "I guess I hadn't thought about doing it," he told Talking Points Memo.

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Sen. Jim DeMint wanted to do that thing where one senator can demand that bills be read aloud in their entirety. DeMint was going to give the New START treaty and the omnibus spending bill the bedtime story treatment, until, apparently, Mitch McConnell made him back down. (But not before Harry Reid's press secretary got in this awesome zing. Hey, Harry Reid's press secretary, you wouldn't have to just impotently insult Jim DeMint's obstructionism on Twitter if your boss hadn't spent his tenure as majority leader enabling the obstruction by refusing to change archaic Senate rules allowing endless obstructionism!)

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As I explained last week, all signs point to Republicans successfully running out the clock on this legislative session without any action on anything besides tax cuts. Robert Gates must be a War Room reader, because he predicted doom for "don't ask, don't tell" repeal on an aircraft carrier, today.

“I’d have to say I’m not particularly optimistic that they’re going to get this done, I would hope that they would,” he said during a town hall style meeting with sailors in one of the ship’s massive hangars.

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McConnell says that the online release of secret diplomat exchanges has done "enormous damage" to the country and to its relationship with its allies.

McConnell tells NBC's "Meet the Press" that he hopes WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange will be prosecuted for the disclosures. And he says that if it's found that Assange hasn't violated the law, then the law should be changed.

Of Assange, McConnell says, "I think the man is a high-tech terrorist."

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Joe Lieberman, who is in the right on this issue, says there are 60 votes for repeal, but he can't say which Republican senators would actually vote to end a filibuster. He can't say which ones would do that because, if the letter all of the Republican senators signed is any indication, not a single one of them -- not Susan Collins, Olympia Snowe, Dick Lugar, or Lindsay Graham -- will vote to invoke cloture on anything until the Democrats finish caving entirely on extension of the Bush tax rates.

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Topping the list of Rangel's transgressions was the misuse of his congressional clout to raise money for a vanity academic "center" named after him at the City University of New York from private donors. Yet somehow McConnell got away with the same kind of dubious dealings at the University of Louisville -- and was allowed to reward BAE Systems, donor of $500,000 to the McConnell Center, with $17 million worth of defense earmarks.

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Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid of Nevada kept his post, as did Kentucky Republican Mitch McConnell, the minority leader.

Illinois Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin will continue as assistant majority leader, Sen. Charles Schumer of New York will stay on as vice chairman of the Democratic conference and Sen. Patty Murray of Washington will remain conference secretary.

On the Republican side, Sen. Jon Kyl of Arizona remains GOP whip, Sen. Lamar Alexander of Tennessee continues as Republican Conference chairman and Sen. John Barrasso of Wyoming remains conference vice chairman.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.

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And in the same month -- September 2006 -- that McConnell made his private request, he publicly blasted Democrats for calling for a reduction of troops in Iraq, saying that their position endangered Americans. 

"The Democrat leadership finally agrees on something -- unfortunately it's retreat," McConnell said in a Sept. 5, 2006, statement in response to a Democratic letter asking Bush to change his Iraq policy. Using blistering language, McConnell continued:

"Whether they call it 'redeployment' or 'phased withdrawal,' the effect is the same: We would leave Americans more vulnerable and Iraqis at the mercy of al-Qaeda, a terrorist group whose aim -- toward Iraqis and Americans -- is clear."

The Democratic letter had asked Bush to begin "the phased redeployment of U.S. forces" from Iraq.

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"Over the past week," McConnell said Thursday morning at the Heritage Foundation, "some have said it was indelicate of me to suggest that our top political priority over the next two years should be to deny President Obama a second term in office. But the fact is, if our primary legislative goals are to repeal and replace the health spending bill, to end the bailouts, cut spending and shrink the size and scope of government, the only way to do all these things is to put someone in the White House who won't veto any of these things."

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Minority Leader McConnell basically ended the president's one method of bypassing a broken Senate confirmation process, by getting Red to keep the Senate officially in session during their upcoming six-week recess. This deal getting struck this time basically means that every future Senate minority leader will hold up every future president's nominees until getting the same deal -- which means that, in lieu of Senate rules reform, we've just seen the end of recess appointments. (Unless future Democratic minorities are spineless enough to give in to future Republican presidents, which is certainly possible.)

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The Wall St. Journal/NBC News poll found that Republicans have a 9 point advantage in generic national ballot preferences; the Washington Post/ABC poll found the GOP held a 13 point lead. (It's worth noting, however, that Gallup's weekly tracking poll, which found a 10 point GOP lead last week, has the parties tied today; go figure.) There was other disturbing news in the two media polls, most notably that voters have gotten less confident in the Democrats' ability to fix the economy and now trust Republicans more on that front.

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What would Republicans do without the "mosque" flap, if they had to vigorously defend, in detail, their economic program? Sunday on "Meet the Press," Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell was as preposterous as House Minority Leader John Boehner on the same show two weeks ago, blustering about having to account for how much extending the Bush tax cuts for the megarich – set to expire in 2011 -- will deepen the deficit. Just as Boehner sputtered and refused to answer repeatedly, then blamed "this Washington game and their funny accounting" for the vexing fact that protecting the megarich will add $3.2 trillion to the deficit, so did McConnell obfuscate. "Why did it all of a sudden become something that we, quote, 'pay for'?" McConnell asked host David Gregory, calling the tax cuts "existing tax policy."

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As the upper chamber's GOP leader, McConnell backed the Wall Street bailout in 2008, calling it "one of the finest moments in the history of the Senate." A year and a half later, he was telling reporters that he vehemently opposes bailouts of big business.

Now, just weeks after that textbook "for-it-before-against-it" feat, McConnell and his Republican cohorts are leaping past the Kerry-inspired fundamentals. Determined to pull off an all-star caliber act of "for-it-against-it-for-it" acrobatics, the GOP is pushing a bailout for yet another big business: the oil industry.

True, we haven't heard that word -- "bailout" -- during the Gulf disaster, which the government calls the worst petroleum spill in U.S. history. But we have heard a lot about the oil industry's "liability cap" -- a term that is just another synonym for "bailout."

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