McCain: Obama worse than Jimmy Carter

Sen. John McCain says President Obama’s handling of the civil war in Syria has made him a worse president than Jimmy Carter.

“I have never seen anything like this in my life,” McCain (R-Ariz.) said Tuesday on KFYI-AM, according to The Washington Post. “I thought Jimmy Carter was bad, but he pales in comparison to this president, in my opinion.”

{mosads}The Arizona lawmaker has been a vocal critic of the White House’s approach to the civil war in Syria, accusing Obama in a statement earlier this month of having “refused to take any meaningful action” in the bloody conflict.

On Tuesday, McCain warned that the conflict was “becoming a regional conflict.”

“It’s spread to Lebanon; it’s spread to Turkey; it’s spread to Jordan,” McCain said. “It is spreading throughout the region, and sooner or later, it will affect the United States of America.”

On Tuesday, Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin discussed the conflict in a phone call ahead of a peace conference in Geneva between opposition groups and the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad.

On Saturday, members of the Syrian opposition coalition receiving support from Western powers, including the United States, voted to attend the peace talks. The opposition groups had initially been wary of participating, objecting to the involvement of Iran and expressing concern that negotiations could merely reinforce Assad’s legitimacy.