Matt Yglesias

McConnell: What’s Good for Toyota is Good for America Kentucky

GOP Senate Leader Mitch McConnell’s not so concerned about the death of the US auto industry because Japanese companies make cars in his state:

“We also have other auto manufacturers who are doing quite well,” McConnell said, naming Toyota’s Georgetown, Ky., operation. “It happens not to be American companies and that is sad. But it’s not like we don’t have success in the auto industry. We do.”

Note that Toyota, while in better financial shape than General Motors, is not in fact doing so hot. Here’s the share price:

I don’t think I’m quite ready to go the full John Judis in terms of economic nationalism here. But it’s pretty aggravating to see these Dixie conservatives who obviously have a parochial stake in letting the Michigan-based firms die off popping up all across the media without the coverage even reflecting that fact. Whenever you see Carl Levin or Debbie Stabenow on television or quoted in the papers, it’s made clear that their views aren’t just stuff they thought up one afternoon — they’re trying to represent the interests of their constituents. But people need to understand that Bob Corker and Richard Shelby and Mitch McConnell all have equal and opposite parochial interests pushed in the other direction — if Detroit folds, then that’s way more market share for Japanese-owned, non-union factories in their home states.

McConnell: I’ll Bring Home The Pork

This argument sometimes works (see Tim Johnson in 2002) but it’s a real desperation strategy, something incumbent Senators only break out because they fear they’re in imminent danger of losing and don’t have much to say on their own behalf:

Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell said Thursday that Kentucky voters would make a terrible trade if they replaced him with a Democrat lacking the clout to deliver huge amounts of federal money he took credit for bringing back to the Bluegrass state. [...] McConnell, facing a hard-charging challenge from Democratic businessman Bruce Lunsford, did not mention the nation’s sagging economy or his recent vote for a $700 billion rescue of the financial industry during a speech to the chamber of commerce in this Appalachian city.

One wonders if this is even true. It certainly is true that as GOP leader, McConnell has had a ton of clout and has brought a lot of pork home. But as leader of substantially reduced minority, would he really continue to have all that much clout? Indeed, it doesn’t seem obvious to me that McConnell would even be able to hold on as leader if, as seems probably, the Republicans lose seven or eight Senate seats. It’s McConnell, after all, who was architect of the unorthodox notion that Senate Republicans should respond to losing their majority in 2006 by launching a lot of filibusters in defense of the unpopular incumbent president’s agenda.