Howard Dean: John Boehner 'A Good Speaker' (VIDEO)

Former Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean lent a little praise to Speaker of the House John Boehner Monday, saying that the speaker's political adeptness left him hopeful that Congress would work out a spending compromise to provide long term funding for the government.

"I think John Boehner's a reasonable person. I certainly don't agree with his political thought philosophy, but I think he's a good Speaker, and I think he understands how you get things done in Washington," Dean said on CNBC's "Squawk Box," adding that he hoped cooler heads would prevail in the ongoing battle to reach an agreement on a plan to fund the government through September.

President Obama signed a temporary solution last week, a two-week stopgap spending measure that prevented a government shutdown. The White House has also sought to take the lead on the next steps to reach a longer term accord.

What Dean said he didn't find reasonable, however, was the GOP's recent insistence on mounting larger ideological battles by tacking on social spending cuts to its budget proposals.

"No one's going to get everything they want here, but the ideological stuff is the stuff that needs to be put aside," Dean claimed, mentioning Republican-led initiatives to defund Planned Parenthood and public broadcasting. "Then I think we can get some serious cuts in the budget."

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