Mitch McConnell goes after the wrong president

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has bestirred himself, finally, to speak out against a president whose behavior has gone too far. Unfortunately, he went after the wrong president.

A sense of shame is not in the McConnell playbook. After all, this is the man who denied even a hearing to Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland — and now proclaims his intention to fill a high court vacancy if one arises before the election.

For years, McConnell has rigorously suppressed his evident distaste for Donald Trump in the service of the twin imperatives of what passes for his moral universe: retaining power and confirming judges. No presidential tweet, no presidential utterance, it seems, requires even the gentlest of pushbacks.

Now comes Barack Obama, with private comments critical of his successor, and McConnell is suddenly worked up about presidential decorum. Obama, in a certain-to-leak call with thousands of administration alumni, described the Trump administration’s response to the pandemic as an “absolute chaotic disaster.” He lambasted the Justice Department’s move to dismiss charges against former national security adviser Michael Flynn and said the “rule of law is at risk.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/mitch-mcconnell-goes-after-the-wrong-president/2020/05/13/989bcaf0-9557-11ea-9f5e-56d8239bf9ad_story.html