Mitch McConnell's fake congratulations, or fake hysteria

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, yesterday:

I congratulate President Obama on his inauguration to a second term and wish him well in the fulfillment of his duty to lead the U.S. at home and abroad over the next four years. The President's second term represents a fresh start when it comes to dealing with the great challenges of our day; particularly, the transcendent challenge of unsustainable federal spending and debt. Republicans are eager to work with the President on achieving this common goal, and we firmly believe that divided government provides the perfect opportunity to do so. Together, there is much we can achieve.

Quite the turnaround from 2009, when he came out of the gate promising to destroy Obama's presidency. He gave it his all, did his best to tank the U.S. economy, yet all that hard work was for naught. Yet it's hard to reconcile those public words with the email he sent his list today:

Dear Patriot,

You and I are literally surrounded.

The gun-grabbers in the Senate are about to launch an all-out-assault on the Second Amendment. On your rights.

On your freedom.

Just the other night, President Obama urged them to act. And then he went one step further, spelling out the 23 different Executive Orders he will take to get your guns.

Literally! I mean, he can't even go to the bathroom because gun grabbers have formed a tight ring around him. It was all he could do to get that distress email out (thanks, Blackberry!).

To his credit, McConnell didn't seem to join several of his colleagues pretending to get the vapors because Obama's speech didn't embrace either the policies or the party voters soundly rejected last November. But it's hard to take someone seriously who claims in public to want to work with the president to tackle difficult problems, while emailing supporters hysterical nonsense about Obama's executive gun grab'when none objectively exists.

Literally.