Quayle advises Obama to ‘stare down’ the left

President Obama must “stare down” the Democratic Paty’s more liberal members if he wants to succeed in office, former Vice President Dan Quayle said this weekend.

“I think his biggest challenge is to tame the left wing of his party,” Quayle told the Associated Press.

“He knows the deficit is menacing,” the Republican said at a golf tournament. “Whether he is willing to stare down the left wing of his party and say, ‘Guys, we’ve got to get this budget in order before we take on too many things,’ I don’t know.”

He said that while Obama had run a “center-left” campaign for the White House, forcing him to make some “tough decisions” about how to proceed with managing his base in the Democratic Party.

Quayle did praise Obama’s choices to lead his national security and economics teams as “good people,” though he did express some reservations about Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s work.

But moving forward, Quayle, a former Indiana senator, urged the GOP to keep its eye on the ball going into the 2010 midterm elections.

“We just need to focus on these congressional elections,” he said. “I think [House Speaker Nancy] Pelosi (D-Calif.) and [Senate Majority Leader Harry] Reid (D-Nev.) will help us in that endeavor.”