January 30, 2010

Boy, wait till the teabaggers get ahold of this guy.

Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, on Greta Van Susteren's Fox News show yesterday, after his dialogue with President Obama at the House Republican retreat:

Chaffetz: But as I said to the president, I said look, I'm just a freshman here, I didn't create this mess, but I am here to help clean it up. So I don't want to hear about the background here, let's work on moving forward. And so, the rhetoric's good. I just want to make sure that the reality's good. And so, I -- you know, it was a good dialogue, I appreciate him coming. I'm not going to just bite off his hand when he sticks it out. When he has good things to offer, we'll be right there with him. But this transparency in the process is critical, and so -- I thought it was a good step forward today. We'll see if it continues above and beyond just this one event.

...

Van Susteren: Well, it seemed to me that it was a good start to have everybody talking, because it's gotten a little high school here in Washington, where the Republicans are said to be obstructionists, and the Democrats are said to be excluding Republicans. Is there another meeting planned, or is this a sort of like -- you know, if it happens one time, it looks sort of like, you know, it's staged, it's a prop. If you do this routinely, meet with the president, that seems like a huge step forward. Is there another date scheduled?

Chaffetz: There isn't yet. I mean, this is something that really hasn't happened in 12 months -- he came over in February of last year, and we had a nice, small exchange. But, you know, since what's happened with Scott Brown, and some other types of things, hopefully it's moving in the right direction.

I think both sides want that to happen. I went up to him afterward, I shook his hand, I thanked him for being here, and said, 'Look, I'm not just gonna take potshots at you. I'd love to work with you.' And he kind of reciprocated and said he had heard good things, and so I hope, I hope, I'm an optimist!

You can start your countdown for the denunciations from Tea Party types, accusing Chaffetz of being a "RINO."

Because everyone knows that real Republicans want Obama to fail. Saying you'll "work with him" is a betrayal of the Tea Party purity test. Heaven forfend.

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