ERLANGER, Ky. — Republican U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell deflected charges by Democrat Bruce Lunsford about his role in an unpopular and largely ineffective Congress and instead put Lunsford on his heals on foreign affairs and how he would have voted on key legislation.
The two U.S. Senate candidates spent an hour tossing each other questions at a Lincoln-Douglas-style debate with no moderator at a morning event hosted by the Northern Kentucky Chamber of Commerce.
Lunsford repeatedly sidestepped McConnell's questions about the United States' approach to the continuing conflict between Russia and Georgia, as well as handling the remaining "rogue states" with nuclear capabilities, Iran and North Korea. McConnell then moved to brand Lunsford as unprepared.
"I think it's pretty obvious that Bruce doesn't even have an average newspaper knowledge of this issue," he said after Lunsford answered the international questions by talking about how the United States had been "reckless" by going to war in Iraq.
At another point, McConnell yielded his time to Lunsford to give him a second chance to answer his question about Russia and Georgia before giving his own position.
"Number one: significant foreign assistance to Georgia," McConnell said, in answering his own question. "Number two: no hasty membership for Russia in the (World Trade Organization), which they want desperately. Number three: put Georgia on a fast-track to NATO admission because the best way deal with the Russians if they want to have an empire again is to draw a line so it's very very clear that you don't go across it."
Lunsford told reporters later that he had prepared on the international questions but that he sought to talk about the "process that has got everybody frustrated."
Read the full story at Kentucky.com.
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