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The No. 3 Republican leader in the House took President Obama to task Friday, claiming he should put the golf clubs down and get directly involved in the budget talks with Congress.

“He’s got to get off the golf course and he’s got to get engaged,” Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) said.

The No. 3 Republican leader in the House took President Obama to task Friday, claiming he should put the golf clubs down and get directly involved in the budget talks with Congress.

“He’s got to get off the golf course and he’s got to get engaged,” Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) said.

“He has a responsibility as a leader,” McCarthy said.

Although he referred to the president’s golf game, McCarthy did not address the highly publicized golf game Obama recently played with House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), the GOP leader with whom Obama is expected to soon meet to deal with the budget deficit and debt-limit crises.

The GOP’s third most powerful congressman accused Obama of staying on the sidelines during the budget deficit talks lead by Vice President Joe Biden.

“Look, I think we can get to the point where we solve this problem,” McCarthy said on Bloomberg TV’s Political Capital with Al Hunt. “It is never going to happen if the talks are still all going to be Biden.”

Yeah, Obama wants to stay away in case the economy turns more to crap and then he can blame Biden and Harry Reid.

No risk, no reward, Mr. President.

How did this guy ever get elected? OH! I know – George W. Bush and John McCain – need I say more?

Plus, the South Carolina Senator has the PAC money to back it up.

Conservative firebrand Sen. Jim DeMint has a message to fellow Republicans in Congress: If you support increasing the debt ceiling without first passing a balanced budget amendment and massive across-the-board spending cuts, you’re gone — destined to be swept out of Congress by a wave of voter anger.

“Based on what I can see around the country,” DeMint, R-S.C., said in an interview for the ABC News Subway Series, “not only are those individuals gone, but I would suspect the Republican Party would be set back many years.

“It would be the most toxic vote,” DeMint said. “I can tell you if you look at the polls, Democrats, Republicans, Independents, they do not think we should increase the debt limit.”

DeMint is not just talking political analysis here. He has a significant fundraising base and has shown a willingness to use his campaign money to support or oppose fellow Republicans.

DeMint will use that political muscle to oppose fellow Republicans who don’t stand firm on the debt ceiling issue. He said he will not support any candidate for Congress — incumbent or challenger — who does not sign a pledge promising not to vote for a debt limit increase without first passing a balanced budget amendment, making deep spending cuts and putting strict limits on future government spending. The same rule applies to presidential candidates.

But, the GOP will have to be careful, because I can foresee the Obama Administration scapegoating the GOP when they refuse to pay out Social Security and military payroll checks when and if the debt limit ceiling crisis hits this summer.

There will be some deals made to avert a crisis, but the Democrats are lirking in the weeds to inflict maximum damage to the Republicans.

• Republicans still give Romney the highest favorability rating among announced candidates, at 61 percent. Palin, who’s keeping everyone guessing about her intentions, is holding steady, too, with a 63 percent favorability rating.
• Bachmann’s favorability rating jumped from 41 percent to 54 percent among Republicans. A third still have no opinion about her, and it’s too soon to tell if her boost will endure or was a June phenomenon.
• Huntsman, who announced his candidacy this week but still is relatively unknown nationally, had a 23 percent favorability rating among Republicans. He’s gotten better known — 59 percent had no opinion about him in the latest poll, down slightly from 66 percent a month earlier. But the result was an increase in those with an unfavorable opinion, from 11 percent to 17 percent, with a greater uptick among tea party supporters.
• Pawlenty, one of the first to get into the race, saw his favorable ratings rise 10 percentage points to 43 percent. His support among tea party backers was up 11 points.

The poll was conducted June 16-20 by GfK Roper Public Affairs and Corporate Communications. It involved landline and cellphone interviews with 1,001 adults nationwide and had a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 4.1 percentage points. The survey included 429 Republicans, and that subset had a larger, 6.2 percentage point margin of error.

This is a national poll and still has Mitt Romney and Sarah Palin as the leaders.

Michele Bachmann and Tim Pawlenty are gaining in favorability because they are becoming better known.

I want to see the polling with Sarah Palin out of the race and Rick Perry in, but we will have to wait for these match-ups until toward the end of summer.