Krauthammer: Obama using ‘ruthless skill’ ‘to fracture’ GOP [VIDEO]



On Thursday’s broadcast of Fox News Channel’s “Hannity,” syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer criticized President Barack Obama for his ruthlessness in the fiscal cliff negotiations, suggesting his aim is to break House Republicans and not solve the fiscal cliff.

Krauthammer also said the president is not as well-positioned as it seems, nor is the GOP as poorly positioned as some people think.

“I do begrudge what he’s done in this fiscal cliff talks,” Krauthammer said. “It’s been very clear from the beginning that he had no intention to solve the fiscal issues. He’s been using this, and I must say with great skill and ruthless skill and success, to fracture and basically shatter the Republican opposition. The only, you know, redoubt of the opposition is the House. And his objective from the very beginning was to break the will of the Republicans in the House and to create an internal civil war, and he’s done that. How did he do it? By always insisting from day one after the election that Republicans had to raise rates. There’s no reason at all to get the revenue that he needed and that the speaker was offering him that you had to raise rates.”

“Obama himself, as you know, said last July — July 2011 — you can get $1.2 trillion by eliminating loopholes, which is exactly what Republicans offered him,” he continued. “So why did he insist on the rates? He said that is what he will insist upon, and that was the ultimatum. He did that because he knew it would create a crisis among the Republicans, and it did. So right up until now Obama has what he wanted, which was a partisan, political success. He’s been less worried about the fiscal issue for two reasons. Number one, he does not care about debt. He hasn’t in the four years. And number two, he thinks he’s a political winner if we go over the cliff. He thinks he’s holding all the cards.”

Tactically, Krauthammer argued the Republicans should hold out and use Obama’s legacy as a bargaining chip, even as the president seems to be overplaying his hand.

“I have argued from the beginning that Republicans should hold out, that they had more strength than they thought,” he said. “That Obama wasn’t holding all the cards. I think he has the advantage obviously because Republicans in all the policy are the ones who will take the blame. But nonetheless, the larger issue, if you are Obama, is not who is popular and who is not, he’s won his last election. That doesn’t matter anymore. What Obama does care about — should care about and does care about is his legacy. If you go over the cliff he may get a bump temporarily and the Republicans will take a hit, but his legacy will be his second term. And if he wrecks the economy, as he would, by not being able to remedy the consequences of going over the cliff, then he’s going to have a failed second term and a failed — history will remember him as a failed president.”