KENTUCKY’S
KING
infrastructure had birthed the era
of the super PAC.
He was proud of it. When U.S.
News & World Report ran a headline calling McConnell the “Darth
Vader” of campaign finance reform, he framed it and hung it on
the wall of his Capitol Hill office.
After 30 years in Washington
spent fighting Democrats on nearly
every front, McConnell has embraced his persona as the dark lord
of Capitol Hill. John Yarmuth, the
Democratic Kentucky congressman
who as a young Republican had
traveled with McConnell organizing college campuses for Cook, says
the two are no longer on speaking
terms. “He won’t talk to me now,”
Yarmuth says of McConnell. “I’ve
known him for 45 years.”
Recently, Yarmuth says, he ran
into the Senate minority leader at
a largely empty airport VIP room.
McConnell was sitting alone with
a newspaper. “I looked straight at
him,” Yarmuth says. “I said, ‘Hi,
Mitch.’ There wasn’t a muscle in
his face that moved. ... He just
buried his head in the paper.”
McConnell’s life has become an
endless campaign.
Marlow Cook is disappointed
in his former staffer. “When you
go to Washington, you make your
HUFFINGTON
08.11.13
WHEN U.S. NEWS & WORLD
REPORT RAN A HEADLINE
CALLING McCONNELL THE
“DARTH VADER” OF CAMPAIGN
FINANCE REFORM, HE FRAMED
IT AND HUNG IT ON THE WALL
OF HIS CAPITOL HILL OFFICE.
record,” says the retired former
senator. “Nobody else makes it for
you. And the record that he has
made, he has to be comfortable
with or he wouldn’t be there. ... A
man makes the reputation he gets.
Mitch has to be satisfied. If I were
there and I were in that position, I
would not be satisfied.”
FRANKENSTEIN
But even in the realm of winning
elections, the purpose supposedly
served by McConnell’s campaign
finance obsession, McConnell’s
actual record is weak — two disappointing terms as NRSC chairman
and an obstructionist legislative
strategy as minority leader that
helped burn the GOP in the 2012
elections. Only in Kentucky is his
party building truly tangible.
Over the past 30 years, McConnell has grown the Republican
Party in the state from a small col-