KATY TUR (ANCHOR): What is first step, Erick, to calming things down? 

ERICK ERICKSON (THE RESURGENT): You know, honestly, I'm not sure that it's going to be calmed down because we're a 50/50 nation right now and both sides have decided that the best way to get their people to the polls is to get them mad at the other side to drive them. As long as we don't have a unifying force in this country, and I don't know that a political leader at this point can be that unifying voice because so many Americans are getting their news and information from so many different sources. They're essentially creating their own online communities and TV communities. There's got to be some gravitating, unifying force. I'm afraid it's going to have to be an external threat. I don't say that wishing for it, I'm just afraid that's the sort of thing it's going to take at this point because the nation has become so divided. 

...

TUR: Erick, in the past you've been pretty critical of the president. You've condemned him for saying certain things. Why not push him more forcefully right now to be a unifier instead of a divider?

ERICKSON: I think he needs to be, I absolutely do. I think he should lay off the American press, CNN or MSNBC or Fox News or any other news network is the enemy of the American people. And I think he does need to do that. I also think there are folks on the other side who need to tamp down on rhetoric as well. We had ricin attacks against Susan Collins and Ted Cruz last week and protesters chasing people out of restaurants. I think both sides need to calm down, which is one reason I think it's not very helpful right now is who started it. Both sides can say the other side did. What we need to come to a consensus on is that both sides need to stop turning the base over to the fringe and the angry mob and actually return to the better angels of ourselves and actually try to get things done, but I don't know that either side really wants to.

Previously:

Why is this man on my TV?

Erick Erickson compares Planned Parenthood president to a Nazi doctor

Erick Erickson: Gay men in bars should expect to be assaulted and women shouldn’t breastfeed in church

Erick Erickson applauds himself for shooting front-page editorial in The New York Times

A look back: Erick Erickson's history of inflammatory and inaccurate statements