President Barack Obama had a message for his political friends and foes on Monday — “just because I’m skinny doesn’t mean I’m not tough.”

After weeks in which he has been angrily criticized by some on the right, to the point of creating a poster image of him with a Hitler mustache, Obama told a Democratic fund-raising event in Miami that some of his supporters have been expressing concern to him.

“I’ve tried to explain … just because I’m skinny doesn’t mean I’m not tough. I don’t rattle. I’m not going to shrink back, because now is the time for us to continue to push and follow through on those things that we know have to be done but have not been done in decades,” he said.

Obama was in Miami raising $1.5 million for Democratic congressional candidates for the 2010 elections, in which Democrats are seeking to hold onto their strong majorities in the House of Representatives and the Senate.

And he had tough words for those Republican critics who he says are not helping solve some of the problems that festered when they were in control of the White House and Congress.

“Lately I feel like somebody made a big mess and I’ve got my mop and I’m mopping the floor and the folks who made the mess are there (saying) ‘you’re not mopping fast enough. You’re not mopping the right way. It’s a socialist mop.’”

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Photo credit:Reuters/Jim Young (Obama at Democratic congressional candidates fundraiser in Miami)