Fireworks At Obama Q&A With House GOP

The president met with House GOP members today for an extended question and answer session that we're hearing got quite hot and heavy. I haven't gotten a chance to watch much of it yet, but here's the entire meeting.

In a session that resembled the British custom where a prime minister responds to questions in Parliament, Mr. Obama took questions from House Republicans, who pressed him on why he had disregarded their ideas and instead advanced what they called big government solutions rather than more surgical alternatives. Mr. Obama replied that he did consider many of the suggestions they had made over the past year and incorporated some of them into his initiatives but found others unworkable or simply political posturing. Rejecting the notion that he had pushed a “Bolshevik plot” on America, he complained that Republicans had caricatured him as a radical, making it harder to then sit down and compromise. The encounter at a Baltimore hotel was unlike any of Mr. Obama’s presidency. While he met with the Republican caucus once before and occasionally invites Republican leaders to the White House, they have never opened their dialogue to the public so it could be broadcast live on national television.