Ben Carson on Independent Presidential Candidacy: 'America Like Cruise Ship to Go Off Niagara Falls'

May 31, 2016 11:26 AM EDT

Former GOP 2016 presidential candidate Ben Carson spoke out Monday during a TV interview voicing he believes everyone involved in politics needs to stop and look at the big picture. "America right now is like a cruise ship that is about to go off of Niagara falls with tremendous carnage and death," he decried.  

New debates began over this Memorial Day weekend when Bill Kristol, editor of The Weekly Standard, announced an independent presidential candidate "with a good record" is going to run. Broadcasters of Fox & Friends then asked Carson on Monday if there was any other person, compared to the crop of Republican candidates who already ran the cycle, who would be more impressive.

Carson further stated that Kristol, and "many others like him," need to recognize Americans should stop and acknowledge the problem. He said Americans should "stop the ship, turn it around and then move in the other direction.

"They want to push a button, and then suddenly all that's done."

Carson said, "We have to make progress," before reminding viewers that a quarter of a century ago, "another Clinton" was running for the White House, and "it was the entrance of another third-party candidate, Ross Perot, that made it possible for him to win."

"Now wouldn't it be ironic if the same thing happened again this time? Wouldn't we be smart to learn from the things that have happened in the past?" Carson posed to the Fox staff.

Carson said it doesn't matter who the current, third-party candidate is.

Emphasizing that the next U.S. president likely would have two to three Supreme Court Justice selections, he said "they need to stop worrying about their petty, little differences," whomever he meant with the reference "they."

The Fox team asked Carson if growing pains are occurring in the Trump camp, after rumors of in-fighting among key Trump personnel.

"What is clear is that there are individuals who are attempting to create conflict," said Carson. "And who are concerned about their own power. Whether they're inside or outside doesn't particularly matter. What we need to be concentrating on is winning the White House again, and stopping the destruction of our nation."

After Carson suspended his own 2016 presidential campaign, in March he endorsed presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump. According to a May 4 report in The New York Times, Trump confirmed that Carson was on his vice presidential selection committee.

Carson now is regarded as having a history of making extreme and inflammatory comments, according to Media Matters:  He claimed the outcome of the Holocaust would have been different "if the people had been armed," fabricated a story about being admitted to West Point, said he believes Joseph built Egypt's pyramids to store grain, and compared advocates of marriage equality to pedophiles.