Pelosi: Obama Has 'Been So Respectful, Given So Much Time To The Republicans' "This president has been so respectful, given so much time to the Republicans, to the point that one time in one of our meetings, I said to the president: ‘Mr. President, I’m busy, and I don’t have any more time for this. You have to be the busiest person in the world. If and when they come up with a new idea, why don’t we just call you back into the room.’ Because he has tried so hard to listen, to accommodate, to be respectful of their points of view. No, I do not think this is why we didn’t reach a grand bargain. We didn’t reach a grand bargain because the Speaker of the House walked away from an agreement that he and the president had arrived at, probably because he couldn’t sell it to his own caucus. And I don’t care what anybody else says about that."