Coburn: White House Bid to Marginalize Critics, Fox News Backfiring

Sen. Tom Coburn on Tuesday urged the Obama White House to show "more maturity and less partisanship," arguing that the administration's attempt to marginalize critics has backfired.

The Oklahoma Republican wrote in a column that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's failed attempt last week to round up enough votes to pass a $247 billion plan to shield doctors from steep Medicare cuts shows the administration needs to get serious about the deficit -- and lay off its critics.

Coburn said the "Clintonesque plan to triangulate and divide Republicans and doctors" failed since Democrats ended up voting against the Medicare measure. And he suggested the administration's recent public criticism of Fox News and other groups has been a wasted effort.

"By spending time on juvenile and crass partisan strategies the president's advisers triangulated the wrong target -- their own allies," he wrote, claiming their "tone and tactics" lost them the Medicare vote.

President Obama and his top advisers have spent the last several weeks publicly criticizing groups like the Chamber of Commerce and the health insurance industry for their opposition to health care reform legislation. They've also targeted Fox News, accusing the network of being the mouthpiece of the Republican Party and not a real news organization.

But Coburn noted that the Medicare measure -- which was divorced from the overall health care reform package -- drew critical headlines from The Washington Post and The New York Times as well.

"Why ... on the eve of the most important domestic policy debate in a generation, are the president's advisers talking about Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh and Fox News?" he wrote. "America needs ... Barack Obama to change the tone and go back to attacking problems rather than personalities."

Click here to read the full Coburn column.