HUME: Let’s assume that for the purpose of this question, which is in raw political terms is it better for the Democrats and worse for the Republicans if the bill passes or if it fails?
MCCONNELL: What’s important is it would be good for the country if it failed.(italics added)
To be honest, no way of seeking to parse, deconstruct, or otherwise interpret that sentence leads me to a conclusion other than it is just meaningless. A string of words that certainly looks and sounds like a sentence in English; yet, when one attempts to figure out what it means, I, for one, conclude that McConnell may have well said, "I am woman, hear me roar," and it would have made just as much sense.
At some point we need to remember that rhetoric like this is just noise, static clogging our airwaves.
Before anyone comments that McConnell is referring to deficits, or some a priori notion that government intervention in any sector of the economy is ipso facto bad for the country; or that, as a Republican, what he really means is it would be bad for the Republicans but he can't say that, let me just respond quickly. To the first, I doubt whether Mitch McConnell has any understanding deep enough to root his politics in something even that obviously false. In fact, it seems the Republicans believe only one thing; they are political Barthians, screeching, "Nein!" at any attempt by the Democrats to make the nation a little better, a little more compassionate, a little more sensible.
As for the second, while that may indeed be true, it would be far preferable for them to be honest enough to say it, rather than string a bunch of words together that sound noble but are really just sounds.
UPDATE: Another example. This kind of thing is so common that Duncan even has a tag-line for it. That it is meaningless isn't changed by repetition.
