Quote of the Day: Buck McKeon on Obama and Libya
Senior GOP lawmakers have been largely supportive of President Barack Obama‘s handling of the upheaval in the Arab world, but that doesn’t mean they’re entirely comfortable praising him. House Armed Services Committee chairman Buck McKeon (R-CA), who held a press conference on Tuesday to discuss the GOP response to Obama’s decision to restart military commissions ...
Senior GOP lawmakers have been largely supportive of President Barack Obama's handling of the upheaval in the Arab world, but that doesn't mean they're entirely comfortable praising him.
Senior GOP lawmakers have been largely supportive of President Barack Obama‘s handling of the upheaval in the Arab world, but that doesn’t mean they’re entirely comfortable praising him.
House Armed Services Committee chairman Buck McKeon (R-CA), who held a press conference on Tuesday to discuss the GOP response to Obama’s decision to restart military commissions at Guantanamo Bay, was asked his opinion of the president’s handling of the situation in Libya. McKeon didn’t want to weigh in on the issue, but then obliged reporters.
"He’s doing a great job, I guess," McKeon said, before quickly adding, "of doing nothing."
The smattering of reporters in the basement of the Capitol building was uncharacteristically silent for a moment, not sure if McKeon was expressing praise or criticism. "Is he really doing a great job?" one asked.
"Of doing nothing," McKeon responded, declining to say what, if anything, he wished Obama would do.
Josh Rogin covers national security and foreign policy and writes the daily Web column The Cable. His column appears bi-weekly in the print edition of The Washington Post. He can be reached for comments or tips at josh.rogin@foreignpolicy.com.
Previously, Josh covered defense and foreign policy as a staff writer for Congressional Quarterly, writing extensively on Iraq, Afghanistan, Guantánamo Bay, U.S.-Asia relations, defense budgeting and appropriations, and the defense lobbying and contracting industries. Prior to that, he covered military modernization, cyber warfare, space, and missile defense for Federal Computer Week Magazine. He has also served as Pentagon Staff Reporter for the Asahi Shimbun, Japan's leading daily newspaper, in its Washington, D.C., bureau, where he reported on U.S.-Japan relations, Chinese military modernization, the North Korean nuclear crisis, and more.
A graduate of George Washington University's Elliott School of International Affairs, Josh lived in Yokohama, Japan, and studied at Tokyo's Sophia University. He speaks conversational Japanese and has reported from the region. He has also worked at the House International Relations Committee, the Embassy of Japan, and the Brookings Institution.
Josh's reporting has been featured on CNN, MSNBC, C-Span, CBS, ABC, NPR, WTOP, and several other outlets. He was a 2008-2009 National Press Foundation's Paul Miller Washington Reporting Fellow, 2009 military reporting fellow with the Knight Center for Specialized Journalism and the 2011 recipient of the InterAction Award for Excellence in International Reporting. He hails from Philadelphia and lives in Washington, D.C. Twitter: @joshrogin
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