GOP senator on Obama: “He needs to take a Valium before he … talks to Republicans”

Afterthoughts from today’s tete-a-tete between The One and Senate Republicans. Remember, one of Cool Hand Luke’s big selling points during the campaign was that “first-class temperament” of his. A man so chill and charming that he’d meet with the Ayatollah Khamenei himself if he thought it’d result in something productive.

Here’s what “first-class temperament” means after 15 months in office.

President Obama traveled to Capitol Hill on Tuesday for a rare meeting with Senate Republicans, but the 75-minute session yielded little progress on hot-button topics and left some senators with bruised feelings.

“He needs to take a Valium before he comes in and talks to Republicans,” Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kansas) told reporters. “He’s pretty thin-skinned.”…

“I’ve always found it’s good to be frank. If you have an opportunity to talk to someone, you should talk about what’s on your mind,” Corker told reporters. He questioned “the audacity” of Obama’s asking for Republican help Tuesday after bipartisan talks on financial reform broke down and his landmark health-care bill passed solely on Democratic votes.

“My question is again: How can you reconcile that duplicity? You say that, but then the big issues have been constructed in such a way to absolutely be partisan,” Corker said. “How can you come in on a Tuesday after [the financial bill vote]? . . . It was odd to me.”

The AP has more on the Corker-Obama encounter, in which The One “bristled” and then approached him after the meeting ended to explain, I guess, why Corker wasted his time for months trying to negotiate with Chris Dodd over financial reform. Now that we’ve got both Republicans and the White House press corps calling him thin-skinned, anyone else want to chime in? The White House chef staff, maybe? Secret Service? Anyone?

Speaking of thin-skinned, here’s a story from West Wing Report alleging that Gibbs told reporters on Friday that they’re asking too many darned questions about the BP oil spill. See, this is why we should require licenses to appear on TV.

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