Tagged: Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell

In a BuzzFeed profile piece, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., celebrates the rise of social media and is praising the fall of traditional newspaper outlets.

Like most conservatives, McConnell views traditional media outlets as bias against GOP views and he appears somewhat elated about the dwindling print media that once held a stranglehold on political coverage.

McConnell says social media allows for ideas to be heard in a more competitive landscape and commented on The Courier-Journal hiring a marketing and sales VP as its publisher earlier this year.

From BuzzFeed:

McConnell, 70, spoke to BuzzFeed in his office overlooking the National Mall; he had tweeted of his plans for the interview earlier in the day from his iPad.

“To the extent that there isn’t media domination like there was in the days NBC, ABC, CBS the New York Times, the Washington Post, particularly since most people on my side of the aisle feel they had a pretty obvious bias … those days are over,” he said. “I kind of like this new environment. I think its much more competitive, much more balanced."

LEXINGTON, Ky. — A Lexington woman has been sentenced to 30 months in federal prison for threatening to kill U.S. Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky.

U.S. District Judge Jennifer B. Coffman handed down the punishment for 50-year-old Susan Mary Collins Thursday for mailing a threatening communication.

Collins previously pleaded guilty to sending the letter on September 2 threatening to kill the U.S. Senate’s top Republican.

According to Collins’ plea agreement, McConnell perceived her letter as a genuine threat that could cause him harm.

Urging federal assistance, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., met U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack on Friday to discuss the impact severe drought conditions are having on Kentucky farmers.

The U.S. Drought Monitor released a new report this week showing the severity of the heat wave and lack of rainfall is worsening across the country, and that the amount of land classified as having "extreme" or "exceptional" drought is over 20 percent.

In a surprise move, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., challenged Democrats to vote on a bill to end the Bush era tax cuts for wealthier Americans.

For the past week Senate Democrats have been pushing a bill similar to President Obama's plan to extend the tax relief for income only up to $250,000 annually. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid promised he had enough votes to pass the 50-vote threshold if not for McConnell blocking a procedural vote with a filibuster.

Speaking on the Senate floor, McConnell says the tax hike will hurt job creators, but that he is lifting the filibuster so the American people can see where lawmakers stand.

"The only way to force people to take a stand is to make sure that today’s votes truly count. By setting these votes at a 50-vote threshold, nobody on the other side can hide behind a procedural vote while leaving their views on the actual bill itself a mystery to the people who sent them here," he says.

A bill that would require Super PACs to release their donor list was defeated due to a Republican filibuster led by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., who has been a vocal opponent of the legislation.

The DISCLOSE (Democracy Is Strengthened by Casting Light On Spending in Elections) Act failed by a 51-to-44 vote, falling short of the 60 votes needed to overcome a filibuster. Since last month, McConnell has ripped the legislation as a form of intimidation being led by the Obama administration.

Local and national critics, including U.S. Rep. John Yarmuth, D-Ky., have pounced on McConnell's opposition, pointing out that he once supported the idea of full transparency.

From The Daily Beast:

Originally, conservatives like Mitch McConnell who backed the money-is-speech position offered the consolation prize of radical transparency and instant disclosure for all election-related spending, including independent expenditures.

But now such a proposal represents, in McConnell’s words, an attempt to “protect unpopular Democrat politicians by silencing their critics and exempting their campaign supporters from an all-out attack on the First Amendment.”