McConnell: No Tax Hikes

POLITICO reports:

President Barack Obama stepped back into deficit-reduction talks Monday, only to be greeted by a double-barrel blast from Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, who peremptorily rejected any deal that would include the added revenues Obama wants together with spending cuts.

McConnell’s meeting with the president stretched more than an hour, but even before the two men sat down together, the Kentucky Republican had delivered a toughly worded speech on the Senate floor and posted an opinion piece on CNN.com demanding that “tax hikes” come off the table. Returning to the Capitol after his own shorter session with Obama on Monday morning, a sad-faced Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) told POLITICO: “The issue isn’t what we’re willing to do. It’s what they [the Republicans] are willing to do.”

McConnell made no public comment after leaving the White House in the early evening and the talks are to continue. The administration insists that a “significant” agreement was still possible, but it also adopted a more combative tone Monday in response to the stalemate.

“Democrats, the administration have shown themselves willing to take on tough issues, make tough choices,” said Jay Carney, Obama’s press secretary. “And it’s important that Republicans are willing to do the same, take on some of their sacred cows, because we have a choice here.