President Barack Obama should act less like an Saul Alinsky-trained community organizer and more like the president of the United States, conservative commentator Pat Buchanan charged on Fox News.
Buchanan, author of “Suicide of a Superpower: Will America Survive to 2025?”criticized Obama’s plans to go to Asia on Wednesday’s episode of “Your World with Neil Cavuto,” blaming parts of his administration as the culprits behind the government shutdown.
“He is president of the United States, and the idea he is flying off on a junket to Bali, and he is going to Brunei as well, when his own country — I mean, after you look at this meeting and just described meetings coming up and the debt ceiling and all the rest of it, I think that’s grossly irresponsible,” Buchanan said. “They ought to put a Denver boot on Air Force One and he ought to sit down and negotiate with these folks.”
“As for the Republicans, you can accuse them fairly, Neil, of trying to shut down Obamacare for a year, then suspend it, then reform it,” he continued. “But they are not shutting down the government. The people shutting down the government are the people that blocked those veterans over at the World War II Memorial from going in there — some character at OMB and the folks over there at the Interior Department.”
Cavuto said it was his opinion that the 1995 government shutdown wasn’t as damaging for the Republican Party as it is being portrayed now — and that it is Obama who has some public relations branding to repair.
“Exactly right — it was not as devastating as it was [portrayed],” Buchanan rejoined. “This one right here, I think the Republicans are not in the best position. There is… doubt the polls have been somewhat upside-down. But Barack Obama is not escaping injury from this. That’s why this meeting in my judgment is being held today, Neil. He realizes he is coming off intransigent, but he gets up and says, ‘Republicans are the ones shutting down the government.’ He is not speaking the truth. And my guess is, in the White House they are saying, ‘Look, you have got to start acting less like one of Saul Alinsky’s ‘Rule for Radicals’ community organizers and more like the president of the United States.’ The country does want this resolve and maybe they are blaming the Republicans. But they are also blaming Harry Reid and Barack Obama.”
Buchanan re-introduced his idea of a piecemeal approach, which would put more pressure on entrenched Democrats to react.
The GOP’s stand to push to reform Obamacare isn’t necessarily a bad thing to have on one’s record going into the 2014 midterm elections, he added.