Conservative radio host Laura Ingraham on Tuesday accused President Barack Obama of abusing members of the media like "battered" women and prostitutes -- that he had a one-night stand with and then left them because "he got what he wanted."

Ingraham told the hosts of Fox & Friends that "you can see the whole Obama machine begin to crumble" if members of the press began to doubt the president's assertion that Republicans should get most of the blame for refusing to avert automatic spending cuts in the so-called sequester.

Fox News host Alisyn Camerota noted that Obama had recently asked the media to leave a meeting with members of the National Governors Association.

"It's like the battered press syndrome," Ingraham opined. "These people are so in love -- many of them, not all of them -- so in love that, like, 'Oh, he's telling me to leave? I guess that means he loves me.' I mean, at some point -- the battered press syndrome -- you have to shake them from this and say, 'You guys have been used and played and manipulated.'"

"Should we tell them he's just not that into you?" Camerota asked.

"Well, he used them," Ingraham explained. "It's like the one-night stand that lasted for four years. He got re-elected, he got what he wanted. 'So, sweetheart, I'll leave your payment on the table and I'm gone.' I'm sorry, but it's embarrassing."

(h/t: Media Matters)