President Obama is warning John McCain that if he keeps jabbering on and threatening to block any nomination of Susan Rice, he is going to have a problem with the President of the United States.
Video:
QUESTION: Thank you Mr. President. Senator John McCain, and Senator Lindsey Graham both said today that they want to have Watergate-style hearings on the attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, and said that if you nominate Susan Rice to be secretary of State, they will do everything in their power to block her nomination. Senator Graham said, he simply doesn’t trust Ambassador Rice after what she said about Benghazi. I’d like your reaction to that? And — and would those threats deter you from making a nomination like that?
OBAMA: Well first of all I’m not going to comment on various nominations that I’ll put forward to fill out my cabinet for the second term. Those are things that are still being discussed. But let me say specifically about Susan Rice, she has done exemplary work. She has represented the United States and our interests in the United Nations with skill, and professionalism, and toughness, and grace. As I’ve said before, she made an appearance at the request of the White House in which she gave her best understanding of the intelligence that had been provided to her.
OBAMA: If Senator McCain and Senator Graham, and others want to go after somebody? They should go after me. And I’m happy to have that discussion with them. But for them to go after the U.N. ambassador who had nothing to do with Benghazi? And was simply making a presentation based on intelligence that she had received? And to besmirch her reputation is outrageous. And, you know, we’re after an election now.
I think it is important for us to find out exactly what happened in Benghazi and I’m happy to cooperate in any ways that Congress wants. We have provided every bit of information that we have and we will continue to provide information. And we’ve got a full-blown investigation, and all that information will be disgorged to Congress.
And I don’t think there’s any debate in this country that when you have four Americans killed, that’s a problem. And we’ve got to get to the bottom of it and there needs to be accountability. We’ve got to bring those who carried it out to justice. They won’t get any debate from me on that.
But when they go after the U.N. ambassador, apparently because they think she’s an easy target, then they’ve got a problem with me. And should I choose, if I think that she would be the best person to serve America in the capacity at the State Department, then I will nominate her. That’s not a determination that I’ve made yet.
Judging from Obama’s answer it is clear that there is a new reelected sheriff in town, and he is not going to put up with anymore of this Republican BS. Obama is done, and if John McCain wants to throw down over Susan Rice, the president is ready. Obama essentially dared McCain and Graham to man up and come after him.
The president knows that McCain and Graham have nothing, and McCain’s promise to block Rice if she is nominated is just the old man trying to jump into the right wing media Benghazi conspiracy theory spotlight. Sarah Jones already covered the laughable hypocrisy of the man who tried to convince the country that Sarah Palin was qualified to be vice president questioning the sterling resume and qualifications of Amb. Rice. But if McCain wants to dance, Obama signaled today that he is more than ready to go.
Since winning reelection, Obama is flexing his political muscles in ways that we haven’t seen before. The president has been emboldened and strengthened by his victory, and he looks ready to take on all challengers. So far, Obama is doing a great job balancing his willingness to compromise, with a don’t screw with me toughness that is certain to give Republicans fits.
This isn’t the Obama of 2010. This is second term Obama, and he isn’t in the mood to play games with those who are looking to score cheap media points, like John McCain.
Here’s a little straight talk for the Arizona senator. Sen. McCain, listen to Obama. This president is ready to kick your butt all over D.C. He already took you to the woodshed once in 2008, and he is not afraid to do it again.
You are not some lowly tea party House member. You are a United States senator, so be smart and back off before Obama has bring the power of the POTUS down on your sorry backside.
PoliticusUSA
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vegaslib
Nov. 14th, 2012 at 6:35 pm
It was so great to see the President coming out swinging. After the disgusting way the President was treated for four years, it’s about time they got some back. I can’t wait for the GOP to underestimate the new/improved, kick-ass Obama and pay for it with their jobs in the next election.
Love it!
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Carol Schmidt
Nov. 14th, 2012 at 6:36 pm
I love how president Obama has chosen to address the Republicans continued obstruction at every turn. I look forward to seeing him deal with all of the stonewalling that they attempt.
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Patricia Ellis
Nov. 14th, 2012 at 7:04 pm
I just love how President Obama is standing up to these ignorant Rethuglicans!! President Obama has the dignity, grace, and intelligence to put these fools in their place. Keep up the great work President Obama!!
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majii
Nov. 14th, 2012 at 7:31 pm
I remember when the president’s “more flexibility” soundbite became public knowledge a few months ago. The republicans wanted to paint him as a having nefarious plans should he win a second term in office. They tried to make hay of it, and, as usual, they misinterpreted the meaning of what he said. We’re witnessing what he meant. The president knows that he doesn’t have to worry about being re-elected so he can say/do some things in his second term that he was hesitant to say/do in his first. This is why he was comfortable taking Graham and McCain to the woodshed today.
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mjh
Nov. 14th, 2012 at 8:08 pm
To paraphrase what White House Press Secretary Jay Carney once said, considering John McCain’s choice of running mate in the 2008 election, he’s the last person to be talking about Dr. Rice’s competence to serve as Secretary of State . . .
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Tom Godwin
Nov. 14th, 2012 at 8:32 pm
Part of me says “Don’t gloat, it’s childish”, then I think of the 1,000 times over the last 4 years that I bit my tongue and acted like an adult, while Teabagger ex-friends ripped our President without mercy. The GOP started bragging about winning this election 6 months ago, with extreme arrogance. Now, I’ve unfriended ALL conservatives from my life, screw’m. I want our President Obama to take the fight right to them, and pull no punches, they lost and they still think they’re the boss. NO MORE.
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DobieTracker
Nov. 15th, 2012 at 2:14 am
Do not mistake—and IF you did, it looks like you no longer do—-keeping quiet i.e. biting your tongue with politeness when those who are making you bite your tongue are the ones being rude, crude, disrespectful, and advancing racist, bigoted, irrational ideas because they are reacting emotionally instead of using critical thinking skills.
Those who “go along to get along” and those who don’t realize that if you are not making waves you are not swimming are the same people Martin Luther King was referring to when he said (and I summarize) that those who don’t speak out against evil are just as guilty as those who commit it.
Not fun to realize you are better off NOT having some people in your life who used to be friends, BUT sometimes you got to pare things down to the essentials.
It is part of growing older. Some people get old but not any smarter. Others grow wise.
Good for you ! It’s lonely at the top :)
But you got yourself and that is sometimes more than enough.
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tkb
Nov. 14th, 2012 at 8:48 pm
I absolutely loved it when he challenged in a kick ass tone the hypocrite who would pose doubt about Ms. Rice’s credentials as a leader. I look forward to more getting done with the new found “get the hell out of my way, I have a job to do” attitude. You go Mr. President! I bet if you looked like this during the campaign, you would have won by 10 points at least. Sir, let me just say it right now, I think you will be, when all is said and done, the greatest President these United States has seen. I say that because the haters of the Tea Party truly hate what you’ve done. That tells me you’re truly doing the right job. God Speed Mr. President.
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Geff
Nov. 14th, 2012 at 9:08 pm
I’d love President Obama to file charges on the lot of them for making promisses to sabotage every effort he had during the fist term. Hang the tritors. Start with Minority senate speaker. That traitor should hang.
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Bill Willey
Nov. 14th, 2012 at 9:29 pm
To see a man who not that long ago was a man of principle become a shill for the baggers is sad to see.
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galactusx
Nov. 14th, 2012 at 9:35 pm
They forgot about the first Rice, CONdoleeza that said there would be mushroom clouds in America if we did not invade Iraq.
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galactusx
Nov. 14th, 2012 at 9:38 pm
I agree, screw the conservatives. They have shown no mercy to the President that save all of our asses when he took office. He had 48 hours to do it and he made bold moves and we are here now because of President Barack Obama. F you ingrates. Now get out of the way because we are going to “Tread on You.”
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luciboo
Nov. 14th, 2012 at 9:46 pm
Liberals have waited since 2000 for the Dems to show some backbone. I couldn’t be prouder of the President.
Liberals stand up straight and proud!
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DobieTracker
Nov. 15th, 2012 at 2:25 am
Too often liberals have taken the “be nice”, “love everyone”, “we’re all beaugiful”, “learn to forgive” Oprah style of humanism and it has disgusted me since as a late blooming “Beat” the first hippies invaded North Beach in San Francisco.
Disgusted me because I knew it was shallow, make people fee “good” inside and they could use their “life philosophy” as a means of avoiding confrontation.
Well, the GOP, even before the Teaparty knew we not only took a knife to a gunfight, but more often than not didn’t even have a knife, only “words of peace and love” i.e. like Miss America contestants, we just “wanted world peace.”
Time to grow up, cut the shallow crap and realize there are bad,ugly, evil people in this world and they are not all outside our borders.
Too many of the hippie generation were sheltered, upper middle class (or rich) kids rebelling against mom and dad and never had to encounter the ugly side of “civilized society.”
One good thing that has come from the TeaParty is that they have ripped the dark glasses off a lot of people and made them realize they better stand up on their hind legs and fight back or else there would not ever be “world peace.”
Liberals need to grow up and learn that BEFORE YOU CAN LOVE ANY ONE ELSE—MUCH LESS EVERY ONE ELSE–YOU HAVE TO LOVE YOURSELF AND VALUE YOUR EXISTENCE OVER AND ABOVE THAT OF ILK THAT THIS LAST ELECTION REALLY BROUGHT OUT FROM UNDER THEIR ROCKS.
Sarah Palin was our first obviously mentally ill politician ( in very recent time, I KNOW they have always existed ) but she was JUST the first, certainly NOT the last.
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Peter Hockley
Nov. 15th, 2012 at 3:04 pm
I’ve never believed The Hippy schtick, and yes I’m a member of that generation.
But Palin the fist mentally ill politician! You write like you remember The 60′s and you don’t remember Tricky Dick and Spiro T. Agnew and their mentally deranged cohorts!
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DobieTracker
Nov. 16th, 2012 at 9:20 am
Sorry, I was upset and venting.
Of COURSE I remember Nixon, just typing too fast to stop and think :)
And of course, and I did mention this, we have always had some nut jobs running for and/or in office, but Palin and Romney and Herman Cain and Allen West and Michelle Backman, and what’s her name who felt the need to deny she was a witch—they just came out from under their rocks after seeing how Palin got as far as she did.
I agree with you, we are on the same page. Nixon was not all there and Regan had dementia in the latter part of his presidency.
Alway had nuts and likely always will, but cheeeezzze these have been overconfident, undeserving, truly mentally unstable idiots.
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bluerose
Nov. 14th, 2012 at 11:47 pm
good on you Mr President.
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sandy reid
Nov. 15th, 2012 at 1:33 am
I am so proud of you Mr. President. This is what I have been praying for. Stand up to these creeps and show them who you are. Your press conference today was magnificent. I am also sick and tired of hearing how the only people who voted for President Obama are black, on welfare etc. etc. I am a white middle class woman who owns her own home and has worked all her life. I am also happy that there finally is a black man that ran for a high office that black people could identify with and look up to as a power of example. You bring us all together Mr. President and we are better for that. God bless you.
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Scott
Nov. 17th, 2012 at 12:57 am
Brings us all together?!!!! Are you serious? This is the most divided this country has been since the civil war! Come out of your cave and look around, it’s not whether the man/women is black (blue, green, yellow), its can he lead us out of this crises. Maybe he inherited (asked) for this mess, well heck, firemen inherit messes too, you don’t see them throwing gas on it!!!
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Shiva (Moderator)
Nov. 17th, 2012 at 8:09 am
The bright spot is, the division started when Bush decided to start killing muslims. Its still here
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rodger dodger
Nov. 15th, 2012 at 2:02 am
Political commentators have been fascinated the last two weeks with the concept of the GOP as a party in transition. The notion seems to be that because the Republicans SHOULD change, they are therefore changing.
They are not changing now. McCain and Graham showed today that Republicans are doing now what they have made into an art form and what they do best–obstruction by a minority.
They should be taken at face value. How else to explain these two Senators acting like blockheads, calling for investigations, threatening to stop a nomination before it has even been made!
So, the press is jumping the gun on the “New GOP” meme, but Obama is acting like he understands this, and that he is dealing with the same bunch of saboteurs as in the last Congress.
In the Senate, filibuster reform is the only way to defang this minority party. The Senate Rules, not the Constitution, created the Filibuster, and 55 Senate Democrats can eliminate or at least reform it on the first day of the next Congress, January 20. Personally, I don’t see room for half-measures–the Filibuster is now toxic.
Write your senators. That is the best answer to these the two jack-a-napeses, McCain and Graham.
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DobieTracker
Nov. 15th, 2012 at 2:08 am
“Judging from Obama’s answer it is clear that there is a new reelected sheriff in town, and he is not going to put up with anymore of this Republican BS. Obama is done, and if John McCain wants to throw down over Susan Rice, the president is ready”
YES ! There’s a new sheriff in town!
The gloves are off and need to stay off for the next 4 years.
Times to treat this like the street fight it is !
Bare knuckle time !
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Faux Romney
Nov. 15th, 2012 at 2:55 am
the president has his game on! Was simply wonderful to watch Pres. O in his newer role today.
McCain and Graham started all this crazy talk business…do they really want to pursue this? With so much flack coming out today they will wish they hadn’t started all of this
People here just have to see the great takedown Lawrence O’Donnel did tonight on his cable show. Be sure to check it out if you haven’t already done so.
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Goddess1871
Nov. 15th, 2012 at 10:37 am
That was quite possibly one of the classiest smackdowns I’ve ever seen.
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Gollum
Nov. 15th, 2012 at 8:48 pm
Republicansez, trickzy,rotten,nasty! Yes, fellow Libs, Time to kick some GOP ASS!
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Richierich
Nov. 16th, 2012 at 12:11 pm
republicans who????? hahahaha sore losers!!
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Little_Obama4ya
Nov. 17th, 2012 at 4:28 am
I was so glad to see the President finally let them know that he’s takin names and whoopin GOP a– this time around. The American people have suffered 4 undue years of misery because the republicans would not budge on anything. Then, they tried every trick in the book(unsuccessfully) to blame him for all the country’s woes and make him look like a fool. I hope he kicks as much republican tail as he can before he leaves office.
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