Conrad: Obama leaving South Korea without trade deal was 'show of strength'

The chairman of the Senate Budget Committee lauded President Obama on Sunday for leaving South Korea without a trade deal, saying that the president displayed "a show of strength, rather than weakness."

"Because he refused to take a bad deal," Sen. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) said on ABC's "This Week." "Look, I've been deeply involved with negotiating with our Korean friends, and they have used every stratagem to avoid previous commitments they have made. And the president called them on it and said, look, you said you would open our market, your market, and you've got an obligation to do it, and I'm not going to accept just any deal in order to have a deal.

"Thank goodness we've got a president now who is standing up, even to some of our allies, and saying we're insisting on fair treatment," Conrad said.

Conrad also panned the reaction of the German finance minister calling the Fed's decision to pour $600 billion into the economy "clueless" at the G-20 meetings.

"And to say that they're clueless, I think, frankly, demeans those who make the charge," he said. "I would be quick to remind them we have saved their bacon over and over and over all across Europe.

"They need to remember who's been there for them when they needed help," Conrad added.

Earlier on the same show, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) called the G-20 "dispappointing" because of the lack of the Korean trade deal and countries refusing to get on board a U.S. statement on currency devaluation.