Republican and Democratic lawmakers traditionally sit separately during State of the Union addresses. But as calls for an end to partisan squabbling mounted after Rep. Gabrielle Giffords was shot in Arizona, the centrist group Third Way--and then Senator Mark Udall--proposed that the two parties sit together when President Obama delivers his address on Tuesday.

The suggestion has turned this year's State of the Union into a "massive Congressional date night," as AOL's Annie Groer put it, featuring political odd couples like New York Reps. Anthony Weiner and Peter King and Senators Charles Schumer and Tom Coburn. On ABC's This Week, Republican Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison admitted she doesn't yet have a "date" but stayed suspiciously quiet when Democratic Senator Kent Conrad said he was available. Awkward!

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, however, isn't in the market for a Democratic buddy. On Fox News Sunday, McConnell told Chris Wallace that he would sit at the Republican leadership table, as he usually does:

More important than the appearance of sitting together is what we do together. And the American people are more interested in actual accomplishments on a bipartisan basis here in the next six to nine months than they are with the seating arrangement at the State of the Union.

You can watch Hutchison spurn Conrad, and Democratic Senator Joe Lieberman confess that he always waited too long to get dates for high school proms, below, about 11 minutes in:

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Uri Friedman