(ABC News)

This morning on "This Week," former Obama domestic policy adviser Melody Barnes called Bill Maher's comments on his show Friday relating to Ann Romney "problematic" after I asked her if President Obama has a continuing problem with the comedian.

"I listened to those comments, and my grandmother's voice came in my head.  I thought about the phrase, 'Home training.'  You know, the language, the sentiment are problematic, and the campaign has - and the president has said, look, the civility is - it matters," said Barnes. "The way we talk to each other matters.  And they're going to have to, as you said, make a decision.  I saw David Axelrod in earlier situations when comments have been made by Bill Maher say, 'I'm not going on your show.  I'm backing away.  I'm distancing myself.'"

Maher, who gave a $1 million to the Super PAC aligned with President Obama, defended Hilary Rosen's comments about Ann Romney on HBO's "Real Time with Bill Maher, saying "what she (Rosen) meant to say, I think, was that Ann Romney has never gotten her a** out of the house to work."

ABC News' Cokie Roberts added that Maher's comments, like Rosen's, hurt the Democratic image.

"The fact is, is that it plays into an image of the Democrats as this out of - out of touch with regular people and - and elitist and kind of snooty," said Roberts.

For her part, The Nation's Katrina vanden Heuvel argued that the media is concentrating on the wrong issues.

"I think these discussions about Bill Maher and the Hilary Rosen, Ann Romney, much of that plays into a view that our politics are failing to deal with the massive deep-seeded problems this country has, whether it's, how do you send your kid to college or how do you not get evicted from your home?  Or why do have inequality akin to Egypt's?," said vanden Heuvel. "I think that's - people talk about the elites.  There are people in this country who are looking perhaps at us right now on this roundtable and saying, you're not connecting to my problems or my life.  Let's get with it.  Forget Bill Maher."