Sen. John McCain (R., Ariz.) slammed former White House Press Secretary Jay Carney following President Obama's prime-time address on Wednesday night, calling Carney's statements "patently false."
McCain began his conversation with CNN's Anderson Cooper by saying he was "astounded" by Carney's claim that the Free Syrian Army was now stronger.
Carney attempted to backtrack--similar to Obama's attempted defense of his 'JV' comments--saying, "What I said is, we know a great deal more now about the opposition."
McCain responded with a barrage of facts that left Carney wanting to do nothing more than "agree to disagree."
"Come on, Jay, we knew all about them then. You just didn't choose to know," McCain said. "I was there in Syria, we knew them. Your boss is the one that, when the entire national security team wanted to arm and train them, he turned them down, Mr. Carney."
A history lesson ensued, during which McCain said that Obama's decision not to leave a residual force in Iraq is the reason why we face the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant threat today.
Facts are stubborn things, Mr. Carney. His entire national security team, including his Secretary of State, said we want to arm and train and equip these people and he made the unilateral decision to turn them down. And the fact he didn't leave a residual force in Iraq, overruling all of his military advisers is the reason we're facing ISIS today.
So the facts are stubborn things in history, and people ought to know them. And now the president is saying basically that we are going to take certain actions, which I would favor. But to say that America is safer, and that the situation is very much like Yemen and Somalia, shows me that the president really doesn't have a grasp for how serious the threat of ISIS is.