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VIDEO: Oklahoma Senator Coburn Dislikes GOP Strategy To Defund Obamacare

Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) greeting President Barack Obama.
Tom Coburn
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The U.S. Senate resumed consideration Thursday of the House continuing resolution to fund the government for the next fiscal year that begins Tuesday.

But Oklahoma's junior U.S.  Senator says he won't vote for any continuing resolution. Speaking to MSNBC's Morning Joe Thursday morning, U.S. Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) says CRs don't allow managers at federal agencies any opportunity for long-term planning.

"We've got wonderful federal employees at almost all the agencies,” Coburn says. “We put them in handcuffs with a CR. So it's a terrible way to run the government. I don't vote for CRs. There can't be a sweetener to get me unless it is cutting spending for the rest of the year."

http://youtu.be/bww4LTYeB-s

Coburn also said while he'd like to eliminate the Affordable Care Act in favor of a more transparent and market-oriented health care overall, his biggest problem is with current GOP strategy.

"To create the impression that we can actually defund Obamacare when the only thing we control, and barely, is the U.S. House of Representatives is not intellectually honest,” Coburn says.

President Obama says congressional critics of the 3-year-old health care law have become more irresponsible in their attempts to kill it the closer the law comes to full implementation.

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Brian Hardzinski is from Flower Mound, Texas and a graduate of the University of Oklahoma. He began his career at KGOU as a student intern, joining KGOU full time in 2009 as Operations and Public Service Announcement Director. He began regularly hosting Morning Edition in 2014, and became the station's first Digital News Editor in 2015-16. Brian’s work at KGOU has been honored by Public Radio News Directors Incorporated (PRNDI), the Oklahoma Association of Broadcasters, the Oklahoma Associated Press Broadcasters, and local and regional chapters of the Society of Professional Journalists. Brian enjoys competing in triathlons, distance running, playing tennis, and entertaining his rambunctious Boston Terrier, Bucky.
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