U.S. Senator Claire McCaskill of Missouri says she was embarrassed by the actions of Congress during the recent debt ceiling debate.
McCaskill visited a number of manufacturers around the state this week to learn how to create more jobs and stop work from being shipped overseas. And she says she got an earful from constituents upset with Congress' inability to compromise on extending the debt ceiling.
"When the most noise in the political system is being made by the very far left and the very far right, it makes it very difficult for us to solve the hard problems," McCaskill said. "The easy problems, you don't need compromise. It's just the hard stuff that you've got to have compromise on. And that's what happened with the debt ceiling."
McCaskill says she's confident that Congress is now serious about cutting spending. (A so-called "super committee on deficit reduction" has been named to cut the deficit by $1.2 trillion over the next ten years).