McConnell details political goals

>> what do you say about all the division within the republican party ? look at the difference between senate republicans, house republicans, the fact that speaker boehner doesn't seem to be in a position to negotiate with the white house any further. that seems to be falling all to you. how much damage does it do to your goals for the government that the republican party seems to be so divided over what you have just done on the fiscal cliff, and continues to be divided over the way forward on taxes and spending?

>> well, there are divisions among senate democrats as well. in fact, i don't think there's a bipartisan -- i think there's a bipartisan majority in the senate for not raising taxes further. in other words, taking the same view that i do, which is that the tax issue has been resolved. it's behind us. so there are divisions on both sides. i mean, we can spend a lot of time talking about that. but the requesty is, what are we going to do for the country in the meantime? the american people chose divided government . we have a democratic president, democratic senate, and a republican house. they expect us to figure out some way to make progress for the country. that's my view. i wouldn't have chosen this government. i voted for mitt romney . if mitt romney were elected, nobody's taxes would have gone up. but this is the government we have. and can we make some progress for the country over the next two years? i'm hopeful we can.

>> you said notably in the president's first term that your number one political goal was to make him a one-term president. he is now a two-term president. what's your number one political goal today?

>> well, as bob woodward pointed out, all of you left out the second part of that discussion, which is that was a long time off in the future and meantime we needed to do important things for the country. my goal is always to try to accomplish progress to achieve things for the american people . the single biggest issue we have right now is this massive, massive debt hanging over the heads of our children and grandchildren. we need to address it. and the american people elected divided government . they expect us to deal with the problems, even though they are hard to deal with, when you have different points of view. i would hope the president would step up to the plate here and say, we need to do something about this spending addiction ,