Calling people names while assessing blame for the government shutdown is a "third-grade" tactic, Dr. Ben Carson told "Fox & Friends."
"I'm very hopeful that, at some point, people will grow up and stop the third-grade tactics of calling people names," Carson said Friday.
Carson, a retired surgery professor at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, came into the national spotlight after criticizing Obamacare at this year's National Prayer Breakfast, where President Barack Obama was in attendance.
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"When we start ascribing blame, I find it quite interesting that a lot of people want to say, 'It's all the Republicans.' But, the fact of the matter is, it was the president and his group who were quite willing to allow the country to go off the cliff in order to protect their pet program," he added.
The Republicans, who "went right up to the brink" during the shutdown, have a message of responsibility for the American people, Carson said.
"The message (is one of) of personal responsibility and fiscal responsibility on behalf of everybody. But also recognizing the Republicans went right up to the brink. They did fight. Most of the time they wilt long before this," he said.
Americans are not each others' enemies, Carson maintained, pointing to the people who wish to divide everybody into "more controllable units."
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"We, the American people, are not each other's enemies. The enemies are those people behind the curtain jerking everybody's chains and trying to divide us up by age, by race, by income, by virtually anything they can, because these are more controllable units," he said.
"People, I believe, are waking up," Carson added.
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