John McCain shocked everyone with his announcement that he was “suspending” his campaign to deal with the financial crisis and he suggested there was simply no time for a debate with Obama.
But, what - exactly - did he “suspend”? His surrogates are all over television, attacking Obama. His campaign ads are still running and his Internet fundraising is still operational.
McCain’s press crew is fully operational. He spent the day with Rick Davis, his lobbyist campaign manager. And all of his campaign offices are still open and fully operational.
And now comes word via Jonathan Martin at The Politico that McCain will spend the evening doing interviews on ABC, NBC, and CBS.
He spent the day with Rick Davis, his lobbyist campaign manager. And all of his campaign offices are still open and fully operational.
Sounds like the only thing John McCain wants to put on hold is the debate with Barack Obama. And who could blame him? He’s got a lot of explaining to do to the American people about how the GOP and their cronies got us into this mess.
What Part of McCain’s Campaign Has Been Suspended - John Mccain?
With the bail out in the front of all issues one could not help but ask the question of if McCain had other reason's than ducking the debate between Obama and himself.
Such as derailing the bail out talks or trying to block or suspend the Palin & Biden debate.
All the reports out of yesterday's White House summit is that John McCain basically cratered the bailout deal, then sat silently at the table while Barack Obama (with little help from President Bush) tried in vain to broker a compromise.
From the NY Times:
[McCain] sat silently for more than 40 minutes, more observer than leader, and then offered only a vague sense of where he stood, said people in the meeting....it was Mr. Obama presenting himself as the old hand at consensus building, and as the real face of bipartisan politics.
From CNN via Daily Kos:
After the cameras left, Boehner started ranting about the right wing "plan" (deregulation, capital gains tax cuts, and an insurance plan that Paulson said won't work).
Bush was silent, and McCain said nothing. It seems as though Obama was the only one who tried to lead the meeting to some productive conclusion. CNN said that Obama first tried to reason with Boehner, and ask him to detail what his plan was.
After he did this, Obama calmly asked Paulson if it would work, and Paulson said that it definitely would not work (which was why house republicans didn't ask him about this at the meeting yesterday). Obama continued with his attempts to salvage the mess that McCain created and refused to correct, but was unable.
From Ben Smith at Politico:
McCain’s high-wire intervention in the financial crisis is his latest showstopper move – and his riskiest. He might succeed, but the candidate’s penchant for the dramatic has also raised anew potentially damaging questions of his age, executive abilities and, most of all, his temperament."
He has been pretty erratic – there's no other way to describe what we've seen out of this guy in the last week," an Obama aide said of McCain's conduct during the financial crisis.Another Democratic official cited McCain's "erratic, all over the map response to the economic crisis."Andrew Sullivan nails it in his analysis of yesterday's White House meeting:
[O]ne of them (Obama) is deliberative and sane; the other one (McCain) is impulsive and, in the evidence of the last month, borderline. My worry about Obama is that he may be too cautious. But then I look at his campaign and see one of the most daring, yet unfailingly professional and careful operations. And I feel reassured.
After seeing Palin's performance with Katie Couric, McCain should be in a panic.
Or maybe fearing these questions from reporters toward her on these issues :
Todd Palin's Secretive Political Work
"Dairygate".
Palin, TrooperGate, RapeKitGate...and Joel'sArmyGate
I'll Try to Find You Some and I'll Bring Them to You.
Palin Answering Couric
Palin: I can give you examples of things that John McCain has done, that has shown his foresight, his pragmatism, and his leadership abilities. And that is what America needs today.
Couric: I'm just going to ask you one more time - not to belabor the point. Specific examples in his 26 years of pushing for more regulation.
Palin: I'll try to find you some and I'll bring them to you.
That should read any.
And kind of explains the reason why controlled media inter-action in Fl. & New York and maybe why the push for McCain's debate with Obama to be reset for the date of the Palin's debate.
Conservatives Begin Questioning Palin’s Heft
It would now appear the GOP it's self now asking the same question.
http://www.northcoastblog.com/
http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/09/16/palin.solo/index.html
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5ijGq94pVTj9FGiR-c5EdA3iSm2owD93CGVI01
John McCain's campaign now wants to suspend the VP debate?
CNN's Dana Bash reports that McCain officials are "trying to negotiate with the Obama campaign and the presidential debate commission" to change next Thursday's planned vice presidential debate into a McCain-Obama affair.
The VP debate would be postponed to another date.
"That is what they are proposing," Bash reported. "[McCain officials] understand very well that both the Obama campaign and the debate commission have no intention of delaying Friday's debate, but...if there is no bailout deal by Friday, McCain has no plan to go to debate."
Update: ABC News confirms the plan.
Relations between John McCain and the press corps that was once described as his "base" have fully deteriorated.
After an appearance in Strongsville, Ohio, on Tuesday, the Senator blissfully ignored questions about the bailout plan from nearby reporters, prompting one journalist to scream out: "Has your bus become the No Talk Express?"
McCain offered a smirk at the line but kept on walking. "Ok, pool, back to the vans!" said an aide. "That was fun."
The outburst came as the press pool accompanying vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin nearly revolted on Tuesday, after the campaign banned reporters from covering her first meetings with world leaders, in favor of photographers and a singular television news crew.
Reporters have also sharply criticized the GOP ticket for avoiding questions from the Fourth Estate.
It's been 40 days since the Senator has taken a question from a national reporter, though word leaked out today that McCain is planning his first press conference since August 13. Gov.
Sarah Palin, meanwhile, has yet to host a press availability.
"The woman seeking to be to a heartbeat away from the presidency without ever holding a press conference remains on the same relatively unaccountable path," ABC's Jake Tapper wrote on his blog. "
McCain-Palin campaign officials apparently feel the American people should trust her with the button and the world's financial markets without ever taking questions from reporters."
Sarah Palin’s “press availability” near the sight of the 9/11/01 attacks in lower Manhattan
She doesn’t support the bailout until “the provisions that John McCain has offered” are incorporated into the bill??? What provisions?
It was BHO that offered the four points; McCain would only agree to the generic preamble.
Indeed, as noted here yesterday, Barack Obama tried to negotiate a joint statement on the financial crisis with John McCain.
McCain left the Obama folks hanging all day while he hobnobbed with a wealthy benefactor and crafted a plan (and talking points) to pretend suspend his campaign.
Late in the day, after all of McCain’s histrionics, McCain and Obama jointly released the most generic of statements:
The American people are facing a moment of economic crisis. No matter how this began, we all have a responsibility to work through it and restore confidence in our economy.
The jobs, savings, and prosperity of the American people are at stake.
Now is a time to come together – Democrats and Republicans – in a spirit of cooperation for the sake of the American people. The plan that has been submitted to Congress by the Bush Administration is flawed, but the effort to protect the American economy must not fail.
This is a time to rise above politics for the good of the country. We cannot risk an economic catastrophe. Now is our chance to come together to prove that Washington is once again capable of leading this country.
There are no proposals in that statement—not in the “joint” part, anyway. Obama went on to add a five-point amendment to the statement when it was posted on his campaign’s website.
McCain, too busy not appearing on David Letterman, issued no additional points, recommendations, guidelines, or proposals.
And it doesn’t seem he privately phoned in any suggestions, either. Senate Banking Committee Chair Chris Dodd, appearing late last night on The Rachel Maddow Show, said that he had “never heard from McCain on the issue” of the economic crisis.
Ranking Republicans involved in the negotiations also stated that they had not spoken with McCain.
Thursday. After spending the previous night in New York City and making a speech at the Clinton Global Initiative in the morning, McCain finally got on his plane and flew down to DC, arriving after Congressional negotiators had already announced a deal in principle.
McCain went to the planned afternoon meeting at the White House that included Congressional leaders, President Bush, and Hank Paulson, and, according to reports, then started pitching a new plan:
During the White House meeting, it appears that Sen. John McCain had an agenda He brought up alternative proposals, surprising and angering Democrats.
He did not, according to someone briefed on the meeting, provide specifics.
One the proposals — favored by House Republicans — would relax regulation and temporarily get rid of certain taxes in order to lure private industry into the market for these distressed assets.
That approach has been rejected by Senate Democrats, Senate Republicans and, to this point, the White House. During the meeting, according to someone briefed on it, Sec. Henry Paulson told those assembled that the approach was not workable.
Members of the House Republican caucus, never happy with the prospect of large-scale government intervention in the markets, sided with McCain, and the deal unraveled. Negotiations broke down, and the air of bipartisanship that seemed to pervade Washington talk most of the week has dissipated.
Democratic leaders are clearly angered. Chairman Dodd, appearing on CNN, said that if Republicans had an alternative plan, they should have offered it at the beginning of the week, at the beginning of negotiations, not at the White House photo op organized to announce a deal.
“Instead of being a rescue plan for the economy,” decried an exasperated Dodd, “it became a rescue plan for John McCain. . . . I didn’t quite understand what was going on down there [at the White House] except political theater.”
Now, we can clearly see that this McCain campaign bailout plan was premeditated.
We suspected this before, and now, thanks to Sarah Palin’s loose lips, we have proof. Palin’s mention of not supporting a compromise bailout plan until it included McCain’s proposals—hours before McCain had actually made any proposals—revealed the McCain camp’s politics first, country second strategy.
As Barack Obama stated after talks broke up, “What I found and I think was confirmed today when you inject presidential politics into delicate negotiations it is not necessarily as helpful as it could be.”
That all depends on who you were planning to help, Senator, the American people, or John McCain.
Having come up with technology so advanced McCain can win the debate before he even announced whether he'd show up for the debate.
This ad aired before it was decided before McCain decided if he where to take part
McCain Wins Debate
Promoting the conclusion that has been seen before jumping to the answer to the issue before all the facts are in and proved to be the truth.
Now the debate has taken place and the public having viewed the debate not just being feed the facts those feel that whining public have the need to know.
The true facts are a bit different.
Obama vs. McCain: Early Results
By the numbers: Obama wins first debate
Obama the victor, poll says
Boston Globe - United States In an instant poll released early today, most Americans believed that Barack Obama won Friday night's debate over John McCain. The survey by CNN/Opinion
I add this link for one reason alone some thing that another picked up on as well.
Politics, life, and other things that matter
And it was in watching the replay that I picked up my absolute favorite unsung moment of the debate.
It came when Senator McCain was stumbling with Ahmadinejad’s name.
He was stumbling hard, almost unable to get the name or any semblance of it pronounced. Very quietly, but audibly Senator Obama can be heard saying something.
In the first viewing, I knew he had said something there, but was unable to decipher exactly what he had said.
In listening to the replay it’s easy to hear his comment.
He quietly acknowledged to Senator McCain “That’s a tough one.” When I heard his remark, his gracious nod to the Senator’s struggle to pronounce a very difficult name, his compassion for the man, I choked up.
It humbled me. It made me briefly look inward, and feel lesser for originally maybe hoping that it was some cutting barb. And it showed him as a man greater than politics, greater for inspiring empathy and compassion for a fellow man.
Senator McCain’s demeaning, belittling style in the debate has drawn criticism.
Rightly so in my opinion. Some has been said of Senator Obama’s gracious and respectful style, some even criticizing his style for not being more vicious, more attacking.
But to me, the real measure of the man, not his “style”, but who he is, came in that comment.
It was a very quiet statement. But what it said about Barack Obama is loud and clear.
This man is not only a great leader, he is a very good man.
No comments:
Post a Comment