McConnell: American health care already the best, reform slowly

America already has "the finest health care in the world," and any reforms to the system ought to be "incremental," Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said at a town hall on Monday.

"I can't recall the last time anybody suggested they ought to go to Cuba for a serious piece of surgery, so I want to congratulate you on what you're doing,” he told an invitation-only crowd at the Children's Mercy Hospital in Kansas City.

Appearing alongside Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Kit Bond (R-Mo.), McConnell also ripped Democrats for pursuing health care reforms that he believed would inflate the deficit, increase the tax burden on small businesses and exacerbate the many problems already hampering Medicare and Medicaid.

“I hope when we go back in after Labor Day that we will step back, start over, and think about the incremental adjustments we need to make in the world's finest healthcare,” McConnell reiterated.

The forum itself was free of interruption -- or deviation from the party line -- and the senators took questions for about an hour. But elsewhere, Democrats were criticizing the Republican trio for holding a town hall meeting that was not open to the general public.

Among them was Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.), who vented her reaction in a pithy Twitter message on Thursday. The Missouri senator has held a series of health care forums this month, some of which have turned nasty, and she will hold another town hall today in Springfield, at which she expects more than 1,000 attendants.