BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate

Subject: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 04:38 PM

John McCain will go back to Washington and suspend his campaign so that he may deal with the economic crisis.

He will have to pospone the debate with Obama

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Little Hawk
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 04:42 PM

How is he going to deal with it? Sell his cars and houses and donate the proceeds to help pay off the national debt? Shave his head to raise money? What?

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 04:43 PM

Oops, I posted this 2 days early \ pretend you didn't see this until tommorrow.

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: PoppaGator
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 04:44 PM

Does that make Sarah the Twit the Republican nominee?

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: GUEST,lox
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 04:47 PM

?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

huh?

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Alice
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 04:52 PM

I just saw Obama's press conference.

He called McCain this morning re the economic crisis, then later heard back this afternoon that they want to cancel the Friday debate. Obama said that presidents need to be able to deal with more than one thing at a time, and there is no reason to cancel - that now more than ever, the voters want to hear from the candidates where they stand and what they would do. So... at this point, Obama is ready for the debate, McCain wants a time out.

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Amos
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 04:55 PM

The "Oh no, he didn't!" Award for today goes to Sen. John McCain with his announcement that he's suspending his presidential campaign tomorrow and wants to postpone Friday's debate with Sen. Barack Obama so that he can help negotiate the bipartisan bailout of America's wrecked financial system. Oh, and he's called on Obama to put politics aside and join him. That's certainly a bold move. But why now?

This has not been a good couple of weeks for McCain, and today has been horrendous. The latest Washington Post/ABC News poll showed Obama with a clear lead over the senator from Arizona for the very first time. As if that weren't bad enough, a national poll from Fox News/Opinion Dynamics and battleground state polls from Marist appear to back up the contention that Obama is striking a chord with voters on the economy. This is giving him valuable momentum going into Friday's debate.

Then, as E.J. wrote about earlier, there was the front page New York Times story today contradicting McCain campaign assertions that the firm founded by campaign chief Rick Davis had had no dealings with Freddie Mac for three years. The story reports that Davis's firm, Davis Manafort, was paid $15,000 a month from the end of 2005 through last month.

By making such a startling announcement this afternoon, McCain has managed to most certainly change the subject -- for now.

Maybe he's putting "country first." But coming 41 days before the election and on a day of tough news for McCain, forgive me for thinking that there's more than a bit of self-interest here...."

(Capehart, WaPo)

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: irishenglish
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 04:57 PM

Well its an interesting dilemma, because Obama has said he wants to go on with the debate. I think they should go on with the debate. I think after the debate, they should go back to Washington and work on the Senate's response to the financial crisis as Senators, rather than before hand. One of the two men will be our next leader, and most of us have been chomping at the bit to see them debate. While I don't think this is necessarily some trick up McCain's sleeve to sound statesmen-like and get one on Obama, I think its a little strange to "suspend" your campaign.

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: GUEST,lox
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 05:32 PM

I think it may be a weak attempt on McCains part to appear "presidential" and "important".

He makes out like he doesn't have time to campaign because he has to go to the white house to deal with the important business of government.

And meanwhile Obama (not so presidential or important) should respect the severity of the situation and wait outside until presidential McCain has a moment to see him.

McCain is just a candidate as is Obama and it is up to either of them to reassure voters that they are the best candidate to save the economy when Bush stands down.

The debate is essential.

McCain is shirking.

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Little Hawk
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 05:39 PM

They should do both. Have the debate AND join in efforts to solve the financial crisis.

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 05:57 PM

Told you a million times..they're both full of shit!! Nobody wants to touch it because to make common sense, and/or tell the truth, they'll have to 'sell out' the crooked, corrupt, assholes who are behind them, BOTH!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 06:07 PM

The first mono DEBATE

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Alice
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 06:14 PM

On MSNBC, Barney Frank just said they have made progress with the crisis, and if McCain tried to come in to the hearings with his entourage, he would just interrupt the progress that both Democrats and Republicans working together now are making.
They have at this point included some ownership of assets of the financial institutions, not just the debt, which the president did not have in the original plan. They have also included some help for home owners facing foreclosure and stopping the executives of the institutions from unfairly profiting from this.

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 06:20 PM

idea from Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Little Hawk
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 06:26 PM

"Nobody wants to touch it because to make common sense, and/or tell the truth, they'll have to 'sell out' the crooked, corrupt, assholes who are behind them, BOTH!!!!"

That's for sure, GfS. ;-) However, given the fact that Obama and McCain are running for office, I think they should by all rights do the debate...as well as pretend that they are telling the truth about the financial crisis and working together on solving it... (grin)

I mean, heck, you're playing a part in a fantasy drama, well...you should play it properly I think.

Check out Dennis Kucinich for some honest words about the overall situation.

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Bobert
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 06:43 PM

First of all, John McCain has an ad runnin' where he says that he warned the country of this crisis 5 years ago... Well, if that is the case then where the heck has McCain been since this dire warning??? So the real deal here is yet another Lee Atwater trick and here's how it plays:

1. Obama goes back to Washington and then McCain runs an ad that says "I was right about The Surge and Obama finally got it and now I am right on the economy and he finally got it..."

or...

2. Obama does not go back to WEashington and then the ad goes, "I'm here trying to fix this crisis and all Obama wants to do is campaign..."

There are no other choices...

This is 100% typical Republican bullsh*t on McCain's part but to me it shows desperation...

All mcCain needs is a commercial with him riding up to the Capitol steps on a large white horse, racing up the steps in his armor and thousands of people cheering as he has come to save America...

What a bunch of crap...

If I'm Obama I refuse to cancel the debates and show up and debate an empty chair and balst McCain for usiong the usual Republican trickery and ask the American people if they really want someone who can only do one thing at a time...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: artbrooks
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 06:45 PM

So, McCain wants to suspend his campaign and return to Washington so he can "demonstrate leadership" as the Democrat-controlled House and the Republican-controlled Senate try to come to some kind of agreement to either accept Bush's take-it-or-leave-it bailout or come up with something of their own.   And he will not be doing this as a Presidential candidate, huh? Is that bridge in Brooklyn still up on eBay?

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 07:25 PM

John Stewart asked Obama last month "You are so wonderful, how will you break our hearts?"

Now we know.

Obama urges Congress to pass a clean bail out as written.

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: GUEST,lox
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 07:30 PM

Art,

Yes, let me just pm you my bank details so you can transfer through the £5,000,000 I'm asking for it ...

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Peace
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 07:36 PM

"Told you a million times..they're both full of shit!!"

Bull. That is FLAGRANT hyperbole. I have admired your posts for ages. I KEPT COUNT. The real number is 987,362. Sheesh!

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: artbrooks
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 07:37 PM

Lox, there are no stock yards here, but there are some dairy farms not too far away. I'm sure I can come up with 5 million pounds if necessary...

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Sorcha
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 07:44 PM

Has the man lost (what little is left of) his MIND?

I have a couple feedlots near here too...count me in for a couple million more pounds of the stuff.

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Little Hawk
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 07:53 PM

Peace - Ha! ;-D Good one.

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: CarolC
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 10:36 PM

Ole Miss Officials: Debate Cancellation Would Be $5.5 Million Loss

Ironically enough, if John McCain goes through with his threat to skip the foreign policy debate scheduled for this Friday for the sake of prolonging and complicating the ongoing negotiations over the Paulson bailout package, it may end up creating another distressed asset -- the University of Mississippi's investment in Friday's face-off. Officials from Ole Miss told ABC News today that a cancellation would be "devastating" to the University -- and that a postponement might not be possible:

Andrew Mullins, special assistant to University Chancellor Robert Khayat, told ABC News that the Ole Miss campus has been transformed to accommodate the candidates and the press. Road blocks are in place on campus and in the community and the debate television set for the candidates has already been constructed. He said the university has spent roughly five and half million dollars getting ready for the debate.

Mullins also noted that if the Commission on Presidential Debates asks the campus to hold the debate at a later date, he is not sure the university would be able to accommodate them.

"It's huge. You cannot just say that you're not going to do this thing," Mullins said. "I don't have any idea whether we do the debate" at a later date. "[We] probably wouldn't do it."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/09/24/ole-miss-officials-debate_n_129057.html

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: CarolC
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 10:42 PM

This is what Obama had to say about the bill (when he said, "clean bill", he was talking about not adding any earmarks to it... he didn't mean pass it as is)...


"I believe that several core principles should guide this legislation.

First, there must be oversight. We should not hand over a blank check to the discretion of one man. We support an independent, bipartisan board to ensure accountability and complete transparency.

Second, we need to protect taxpayers. There should be a path for taxpayers to recover their money, and to turn a profit if Wall Street prospers.

Third, no Wall Street executive should profit from taxpayer dollars. This plan cannot be a welfare program for CEOs whose greed and irresponsibility has contributed to this crisis.

Fourth, we must help families who are struggling to stay in their homes. We cannot bail out Wall Street without helping millions of families facing foreclosure on Main Street.

Fifth, we both agree that this financial rescue package should move on its own without any earmarks or other measures. We have different views about the need for other action, but this must be a clean bill."

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/the-trail/2008/09/24/obama_and_mccain_issue_joint_s.html

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Amos
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 10:54 PM

Hell, that gets it all said in one neat set of requirements.

Wonder what McCains "set of requirements" would sound like if he were to articulate them?



A

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: SINSULL
Date: 24 Sep 08 - 11:15 PM

He has missed three days of testimony on the bailout and now he is going in to "save the day"?

Meantime Bush wants to meet with Obama, McCain and Congress for a bi-partisan love fest.

What a crock!

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Peace
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 12:15 AM

'Wonder what McCains "set of requirements" would sound like if he were to articulate them?'

I suspect it woud be along the lines of, "Give us your money free of all conditions because we CARE."

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: katlaughing
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 12:18 AM

He's a little kid holding his breath, saying "pass this bail out" or I won't go to the debate! He actually did say they HAVE to pass something or he will NOT go to the debate. Arrogant bastard. He is going with the wind...whichever way he thinks it's going to blow, he'll try to go with it, hoping something will work on his spin into the dirt. His own party's congresspeople won't let him steal their limelight over this; some of them are just as much against the shrub's bail out as the Dems. They are NOT going let McCain take any credit for that!

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Genie
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 12:33 AM

" While I don't think this is necessarily some trick up McCain's sleeve to sound statesmen-like and get one on Obama, I think its a little strange to "suspend" your campaign."

Forgive me if I sound cynical, but the first thing that popped into my mind when I heard McCain's call for him and McCain to "suspend" their "campaigns" was,
"Yeah, sure. You and your opponent suspend your OFFICIAL campaign appearances and ads for a couple crucial weeks -- while the 90% right-wing-dominated radio talk shows and the TV "pundits" (working for media companies owned by defense corporations, oil corporations, big pharma, etc.) and the unofficial 527s continue their propaganda unabated.
How conveeeeeeenient!

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Barry Finn
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 01:08 AM

MaCain's call to cancel was a sweet but stupid move. He took a bit of the limelight & got it focused so it would shine on himself but it's shinning on his ass. He's a fool to panic & use his reflex for flight instaed of fight. He's not a good enough debater against Obama & Shara will be squash under Biden's foot. But it looks like a good rescue plan if one doesn't take the time to think about it to much & MaCain like Bush shoots from the hip & thinks later. Obama on the other hand decleared that MaCain isn't running his campain which again puts MaCain up as the fool to ever ask before anticapating Obama's reply. He didn't cover his bases before he shot off his mouth.
The public has been waiting for some debates so the canadates can really expose themselves, their plans, thoughts & policies to the voting nation, we want to see them put forth their best sales pitch, we want to see whose got the right moves, brains, charm, disposition, temperment, vocabulary, whose lying & whose holding back? This is not the time to hide what you don't have, this in not the time to run for cover, this is the time to tell the nation what they have in store for US for the next 4yrs & they need to say in what direction they'll bring the economy in, this well be a huge part of the election. The economy is the topic at hand & they better say something about how they see it's future.
Of course MaCain can stay in Washington where's he been for the past few decades, it is after all where he is most comfortable not on
the Campuses of the nations Universities where he gets nervous around those who are educated & who he has downplayed. He does not like the highly educated as shown from his campain position on thsoe that have attended Harvard. What's he got against brains?

Barry

Barry

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Big Mick
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 01:51 AM

I want you kids to put on your thinking caps here, and think like the devious little p***ks a lot of you are..... ****chuckle***

Ready? McCain wants to forgo Friday and move the first debate to the 2nd, right? Whose debate is currently scheduled for the 2nd? Yep, it's the Palin and Biden debate. Now I wonder when we will hear that McCain will say that it really isn't necessary to reschedule the VP debate? Just a thought. He knows she will get wiped in her debate and, just maybe, he has a plan to use this as an excuse to put the VP debates to pasture.

Just thinking here,

Mick

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: akenaton
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 03:02 AM

Can't believe you guys.
You continually complain about messy "Party politics", yet the first time I remember anyone suggesting that they suspending Party squabbling in the face of what could become a National/ International disaster, all you can do is make the cheapest of remarks.

On UK TV this morning, Mr Obama seemed completely out of his depth in trying to summarise the financial situation, whereas Mr McCain was more assured.

I think Mr McCain was correct, this is a serious juncture and neither of the candidates have any meaningful input on how to rectify the damage.

Just carrying on with the same shitty rhetoric gives out the wrong message to the people of America and other countries affected by the financial crimes.

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 03:33 AM

like these buggers give a damn about national/international disasters, and there has been no time to address these matters in the last god knows how long....

wise up ake!

Big Mick has divined the situation. the minute Palin gets on that podium, the games up......if she rises above frothing at the mouth and blaming the commie muslim 1960's students for worshipping the devil and taking drugs for the economy - it will be hailed as a major success - but theres little chance of that. Mind you that worked as a tactic for Thatcher ....'the enemy within' and all that crap.

the name of the game is damage limitation. Concealing how far round the bend the VP candidate is.

if they gave a shit about the economy, they wouldn't have initiated two wars they couldn't afford.

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: GUEST,Spooked by speech
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 07:00 AM

McCain's ghost speech at debate

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Riginslinger
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 07:18 AM

"Now I wonder when we will hear that McCain will say that it really isn't necessary to reschedule the VP debate? Just a thought. He knows she will get wiped in her debate and, just maybe, he has a plan to use this as an excuse to put the VP debates to pasture.'


                  Not necessarily. Just yesterday Joe Biden announced that--"When we had the stock market crash in 1929, Franklin Roosevelt went on television to assure the people..."

                  He doesn't seem to know, or care, that Hoover was president in 1929 and there was no television.

                  With gaffs like that, who will be wiping up whom?

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: beardedbruce
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 09:25 AM

Would Bovert and Amos please tell me what Obama

1. Was elected to do?
2. Has been collecting a paychgeck for, from my tax dollars?


If he can't go to Washington as a Senator to do his job, why should he be paid OR promoted???

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: kendall
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 09:37 AM

A good question, BB. Now how about what has McBush done TO Americans?

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: beardedbruce
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 09:39 AM

Bush is not running, in case you didn't figure it out.


McCain is NOT Bush, any more than Obama is Clinton.

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: artbrooks
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 10:24 AM

Since BB saw fit to start a second thread on this topic, and is making the same comments in both, perhaps some good JoeClone could combine them?

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: beardedbruce
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 10:28 AM

Or kill them both- I started the second in comment over this thread ( name) If McCain is quitting for doing the job he was elected to do, than Obama is a thief for taking money and NOT doing it.

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: freda underhill
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 10:29 AM

Are these bipolar cyber-diversions multiskilling or a cunning attempt to distract? while there's a debate about the debate, is BB multi-threading? are these multiple concepts a sign that we exist in a parallel dimension? the truth is out there...

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Donuel
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 10:31 AM

John is tired. He is ill. He desperately needs rest. He has to revise his approach to appear that he was never part of the problem and that he is actually the saviour of the crisis. Besides even if his health demands a rest, he can not tell the truth for fear of effect on the Palin campaign and we the people.

But everyone knows from their own life that running away is a bad move.

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Donuel
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 11:05 AM

From: beardedbruce - PM
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 10:28 AM

Or kill them both-




Gee Bruce, I would have to reserve that solution for the banking criminals that ran the show and paid the bribes.

Now for a little lite hearted McCain style humor...
how many spear chuckers could a spear chucker chuck if a spear chucker could chuck spears?

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: beardedbruce
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 11:10 AM

Care to give context??


I was talking about the threads- Since there was a comment to combine them, and I protest combining them under EITHER present thread name- BOTH are blatent political statements.

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Amos
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 11:16 AM

AMong other things, he is paid to defends the COnstitution, and has been doing, so far, a better job of it than either Palin, Bush, of McCain.

Obama is not shirking his responsibilities, and it is disingenous and fractious of you to imply that he is. However, he understands that a comeptent executive can handle multiple situations, and denying the importance of these debates on the eve of the election is an act of self-deception he is not willing to subsctribe to. At the same time, he is proposing solid, viable requirements for the debate on the so-called bailout, many of which are now beginning to creep into others' talking points. Furthermore he has contributed mor solid reasoningt to the discussion than McCain has so far.

So don't tell me he isn't pulling his weight. What he ISN'T doing is trying to turn the financial crisis into a political coup by acting it out on the national stage, which McCain is doing because it makes him look bold and important. On reflection, he is neither.

A

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: beardedbruce
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 11:19 AM

"What he ISN'T doing is trying to turn the financial crisis into a political coup by acting it out on the national stage,"


So, all his comments about being better suited than McCain to solve the Economic problems are non-political???

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Amos
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 11:32 AM

Those are statements, not dramatizations undertaken to substitute fo a lack of substance.


"McCain's Ploy

By Harold Meyerson
Thursday, September 25, 2008; Page A19

Slipping in the polls? Concerned that Americans may be paying more attention to the declining economy -- and even supporting economic regulation again -- than to your own stellar leadership abilities?

What's a Republican presidential nominee to do?

If you're named John McCain, the answer became apparent yesterday afternoon -- make the solution to the economic crisis all about you. Suspend your campaign. Pull out of tomorrow's debate -- a trivial exercise merely allowing Americans to judge the two candidates side by side. Change the terms of the nation's economic discussion from the course we should take, and the defects of the laissez-faire model that got us here, to the indispensability of John McCain, leader of leaders.

(Besides, if tomorrow's debate goes on as scheduled, it will doubtless focus on the economy as well as foreign affairs, its announced topic. McCain sees foreign policy as one area where he can outshine Obama. Only by rescheduling the debate after the crisis has passed can he be sure he will have his moment in the foreign policy sun.)

Yesterday's Post-ABC News Poll showed Barack Obama opening a nine-point lead over McCain, chiefly because of the economic anxiety flooding the nation and the belief of most Americans that Obama is more in touch with economic realities than McCain is and has a better sense of how to navigate both the current crisis and America's long-term economic challenges. But the McCain plan for victory this November never counted on Americans picking McCain on the basis of the issues.


As his strategists saw it, they had to confine the discussion to a comparison of the character of the two candidates. Alas for McCain, reality intruded over the past week, distracting the public from McCain's stellar attributes as a decisive leader with news of an impending economic collapse. So the task for his managers has been to diminish this new story to just one chapter in the ongoing saga of John McCain, the man who rides to the rescue.

Can McCain pull this off -- persuading the public to forget how he and his fellow Reagan Republicans changed the nation's economic rules in ways that allowed Wall Street to run amok, and refocusing its attention on his decisiveness at this moment of crisis? I doubt it...."
(Wapo columnist)

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: Amos
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 11:41 AM

For one thing, America may be a republic of amnesiacs, but deep in some seldom-used brain lobe, it does recall that its two political parties have differed on questions of regulation and stimulating the economy, a comparison that does not now work in Republicans' favor. For another, presidential debates aren't distractions from the business of the nation. However confining their formats may at times be, they are central to the business of democracy, and suspending that business so that a lowest-common denominator consensus can be reached in Washington -- or so that McCain can complain that Obama is an obstructionist if he doesn't go along with McCain's proposals -- is an affront to American voters.

McCain's ploy was transparent. To counter the public's preference for Obama's economics over his own, he would get both of them in a room and emerge proclaiming that they had reached agreement, that they had no differences. In fact, they have very real differences. McCain wants to retain tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans; Obama wants to create tax cuts for all but the wealthiest 10 percent of Americans. Obama favors policies -- through investments in infrastructure and education and through legislation enabling Americans to join unions without fear of being fired -- to build the base of the economy, while McCain's record is one of opposition to such policies. Obama favors trade agreements only when they raise labor and environmental standards with our trading partners and protect them here at home; McCain has supported every trade pact that has weakened such standards and has never said one word about protecting our standards or raising them abroad.

Comparisons such as these are odious, however, to McCain's prospects.

He cannot win on the strength of his positions. He can only win on the strength of his character. Problem is, McCain's character, as we have seen in his selection of Sarah Palin as his running mate, is heavy on decisiveness and weak on judgment. In this, despite his campaign's protestations, a McCain presidency would be very much an extension of George W. Bush's. The president helped McCain out last night by inviting both candidates to Washington today to put their imprimatur on a deal that seemed near completion. At the risk of making McCain's gesture look less heroic, he also made it look less self-absorbed.

But self is McCain's selling point. He is either the man on horseback riding to the rescue, or he is nothing -- or, more precisely, the loser come November. Obama, Lord knows, has his flaws, but he does not seem to believe that the nation's crises are primarily about him.

(Ibid)

Subject: RE: BS: McCain quits, Won't go to debate
From: beardedbruce
Date: 25 Sep 08 - 11:50 AM

http://www.mail.com/Article.aspx?articlepath=APNews\financialnewsigtech\20080925\Candidates-Economic-Crisis.xml&cat=money&subcat