If this is not a big enough crisis that McCain and the GOP can play games with it, it is not a crisis at all.
Walk away, Democrats.
Walk away.
*** Update ***
Seriously. Here is the GOP proposal, which includes this:
Temporary tax relief provisions can help companies free up capital to maintain operations, create jobs, and lend to one another. In addition, we should allow for a temporary suspension of dividend payments by financial institutions and other regulatory measures to address the problems surrounding private capital liquidity.
Hand them the rope. Let them cut taxes and shuffle billions to Wall Street. LET THEM DO IT.
*** Update #2 ***
From the comments:
It’s like everyone is standing around watching McCain shove a kid into traffic. Then when he pretends to “save” the kid from getting run over they all start whistling and applauding about what a hero he is.
And they stood there and watched him do it. They predicted he’d do it. They talked about what a phony set-up it was going to be. And they still run with the “McCain’s a Maverick Hero” headline anyway.
Pretty much.
*** Update #3 ***
Of course Cantor’s proposal makes no damned sense. Are you all forgetting who Eric Cantor is? This guy:
All you needed to know about the GOP proposal is that it came from this guy, and you knew it would be full of fail.
*** Update #4 ***
The claim by the conservative dirtbags in the House that their “insurance” plan is kinder and gentler to the taxpayers seems to me to be a rancid stream of raw sewage being marketed as chocolate fondue. Without the full details of either plan, I could be wrong, but, in general, it seems that the “insurance” model is simply a way of giving more taxpayer money to the companies that created the mess.
The difference between the dirtbag proposal and the White House proposal is that under the dirtbag proposal, the distressed company holding a troubled mortgage-based asset gets a taxpayer-funded insurance policy for the full value of the asset in exchange for a small premium payment. Under the White House proposal the federal government pays an amount to the distressed company that will, at least temporarily, assuage the company’s financial woes in exchange for the troubled mortgage assets and an equity interest in the company.
Of course. Which is why I said let them do it. Give them the rope. Let them cut taxes, deregulate more, and send billions to Wall Street. The people will LOVE it.
The Bag of Health and Politics
The real question is whether John McCain will show up to defend his actions tomorrow night, after the stock market has gone down 500 points in a day due to his actions. Will John McCain be able to defend his idea of more tax cuts for CEOs and deregulation, or will he be a coward and leave Obama to debate an empty chair. You’re right–the Democrats should walk away. After today, John McCain owns the Great Depression.
cleek
too late
Comrade DrDave
Look for them to shoot themselves in the foot instead. It’s what they do best.
Incertus
Do you think we could smuggle this guy into the McCain campaign? Would they even notice?
Stuck in the Fun House
eEminds me of one of my alltime favorite tunes. Walk Away Renee.
Aside from all the presidential politics, I truly hope your right about that.
El Cid
Again — is it a “crisis” when things combine to put you in the position of awarding perhaps a trillion dollars or more of taxpayers’ money to the richest people in the nation when you’re convinced you just can’t lose this election; or is it an “opportunity”?
Comrade DrDave
John:
When are you going to change the banner to “Comrade John Cole’s Balloon Juice” ?
A Different Matt
Good thing you came to the party pre-disillusioned!
Incertus
BY the way, hilzoy has an example of some truly boggling right-wing logic from Lisa Schiffren. Short version–trust Bush because he’s not running, and he’ll give the money to the people who need it, namely, the financial industry.
JL
I’m going to print my response from Isakson’s office today and praise the lord, this is not a bailout but an investment. Please lord I do hope that this lenghty correspondence does not bring down Comrade John’s site.
Dear Ms. Thank you for your letter regarding the economy, the financial markets and the proposal from the Treasury Secretary to the Congress.
We are in difficult financial times, and I am committed to protecting the savings and jobs of the people of Georgia by making sound decisions on both immediate actions as well as long-term actions.
First, our economic stress is rooted in the decline of the housing market. The cause of the decline was the funding of marginal credit mortgages (subprime) through the creation of mortgage-backed securities that were sold around the world. As the default and foreclosure rate on these mortgages increased, the value of the securities declined. As the values declined, the balance sheet of the financial institutions that bought them deteriorated. The market for these securities declined and ultimately evaporated, thus causing a liquidity problem for the financial institutions and a credit crisis for American consumers and small businesses.
In the immediate term, we must address the credit and liquidity crisis. In the long term, we must put in place the oversight and safeguards to ensure the transparency and accountability necessary to prevent this from happening again. The Treasury has proposed using up to $700 billion dollars to purchase, at a discount, these mortgage-backed securities. This would provide liquidity to the financial institutions and improve their balance sheets. The important question is this: “Is the taxpayer of Georgia protected?” If the Treasury properly discounts the securities to, say, 50 or 60 cents on the dollar, and holds the securities to maturity there should be little or no cost to the Treasury. More importantly, investors will return to the market and will compete with the Treasury to by these discounted securities and the market will be reestablished. I am working to ensure the safeguards necessary for maximum security for the taxpayer.
In the long term, we must bring transparency and accountability to Wall Street. While I am not a big government regulator, if the investment bankers on Wall Street were held to the same standards of transparency and accountability as our national banking system, this would not have happened. The security rating agencies such as Moody’s and Standard and Poor also share some of the blame for the way they rated the subprime mortgage-backed securities, and they should be held accountable. I will work hard for the right reform of Wall Street.
The term bailout has been used a lot in this debate. Not a dollar of the $700 billion will go to the brokers who created the securities. Instead, they will go to the investors who bought them, and then only after they take a significant discount or loss. Properly executed, the Secretary of the Treasury and the Chairman of the Federal Reserve believe this proposal will restore liquidity to the credit markets and return confidence in the financial system.
cyntax
Ah, here’s where the rubbeer really meets the road in terms of the full-blown abusive relationship I have with my party. Will Dems do the hard-nosed, politically and ideologically sensible thing? Or in total shock of the obviousness of what they should do, will they let McCain and the Repubs play them? Again?
Taking a quick glance at my liquor portfolio, I see I have half a bottle of good tequila, only a quarter bottle of bourbon, some scotch, and a whole crapload of really average vodka. Yep–looks like I’m set for the cable news shows tomorrrow night.
The Dangerman
I’ve never seen a Party run away from it’s own President like this; Shelby was on TV saying Bush wants a Bill and the Democrats control Congress, so if it all blows up and the Market goes to shit, somehow it’s the Democrats fault. Uh-huh.
Then again, McCain said he’s the one that can broker a deal; how is this a win for him if the markets tank?
Citizen Juan del Llano
No damn kidding. Walk away, get elected, then off with their heads.
Bryan Knox
The fact that Bush and McCain are playing games with the bailout does not mean that this situation is not a crisis. They have played games with war, torture, the rule of law, and the constitution itself. Their unmitigated cynicism could very well force the Democrats to clean this mess up and then lose politically as a result. If we lose this election we are SCREWED.
Brian J
I don’t think that’s quite accurate. The Republicans have no qualms about playing politics with a crisis. I think it’s better to say that there’s no urgency, in the sense that taking an extra week to make sure the package is good isn’t going to cause the country to collapse. I don’t know what sort of colorful language or examples to use to get my point across, but I think it’s clear.
Now, I asked this question earlier, but I had to go to work, and it seems to be floating around many blogs, so let me ask it again: does anyone really think that McCain speaking at the Clinton Global Initiative was really a backhand to Obama’s campaign?
Incertus
Everything is always a win for McCain, remember?
JL
Shelby was waving important paper from important people so that was a good visual, right?
tBone
I’m counting on Obama figuring out a way to shove this whole thing right up McCain’s Depends-clad ass. I never thought I’d loathe McPOW as much as I do Bush, but he achieved that distinction today with his craven, cynical grand-standing. Country First, unless it gets in the way of my political ambitions! Fucking asshole.
At least the Bush administration had the decency to wait for the buildings to fall down before they started politicizing 9/11.
Joshua Norton
Short memory. The idiot Dems were pissed at Clinton early in his administration and refused to cooperate with him. They presented such a lack of cohesion to the voters that they lost the House to Newt and crew and the Senate tumbled down the election after.
Everything old is new again.
pillsy
I’m thinking the Democrats aren’t going to fall for this. Not because the Democrats don’t have a long history of falling for shit, but this isn’t really the sort of shit they usually fall for, and it’s even stupider shit than usual to boot.
The Dems get rattled by foreign policy and national security because they have a deep-seated sense of insecurity on those issues. They’re pretty full of themselves when it comes to the economy, though, and they know how the polling goes. I think their egos will carry ’em through this one.
JGabriel
John Cole:
And make the starting conditions for Obama’s presidency even worse? Not so sure that’s a grand plan.
On the other hand, I suppose there’s a possibility that it’s cheaper than putting us on hock for another 700 billion, on top of the already > 10 trillion in debt.
But if that option is to give them the tax cuts, etc., and the 700B, then it’s definitely a no go.
.
LiberalTarian
+2. It appears that I am going to need a couple more.
drag0n
Wait for the Market crash and hang it around the repubs neck. Oops, they did it again! This is a big loser for the repubs.
As noted in another a previous thread. From ABC:
JGabriel
Incertus:
Whoa.
“Right-wing logic” is an oxymoron, but “boggling” makes it redundant.
Hmm. You’re making my head hurt, man.
.
Joshua Norton
Second verse same as the first for Repugs. “No taxes, more war.”
It’s like having a Dr. who uses a medical book from 100 years ago. The patient is dying from loss of blood – looks like we’ll have to bleed him. And maybe use a few leeches. Oh, and run down and get a pound of arsenic from the corner apothocary.
Rick Taylor
I’m catching up. It doesn’t sound like the conservative House Republicans were ever on board, so it shouldn’t be a surprise. McCain’s grandstanding is a bit of a surprise, though certainly in character. It’s so obvious it’s hardly worth pointing out, but it’s ridiculously ironic Republicans have been attempting to attack Obama for grandstanding simply for meeting with foreign leaders, and then McCain pulls something like this.
Incertus
That post made my soul hurt. It was that bad.
PeakVT
Time for every (progressive) Democrat on the Hill to say:
Blue Dogs, please FOAD first.
Kirk
A thought.
Did McCain scuttle the deal so he wouldn’t have to debate tomorrow night? I mean, if it’d been sealed today, he’d have had to go after making Such a Fuss and demanding it be canceled – unnecessarily, as it would have turned out.
In other words, Son of Gustav vs the RNC.
Ted
How? The House Democrats have to get behind it if it’s to be passed. So if they walk away (which would be the right move, IMO), it won’t get passed.
Left Coast Tom
I don’t even begin to understand this sentence. Financial institutions are free to suspend dividend payments today. In fact, some already have. Others haven’t…I guess they think nobody will buy their stock if the do. One might ask why dividend payments should be made _at_all_ by unprofitable companies, if a “dividend” is a distribution of profits to shareholders, but that’d be more regulation, not less. And in any case, again, any bank that wants to suspend dividends is free to do so now.
If this is a “GOP “plan”” then I want some of what the GOP’s been drinking.
Comrade John Cole
There are enough blue dogs that can roll with it, and the important thing is that it be branded as the GOP bill. They put it forward, put their names on it, they own it.
Brian J
If by “ironic” you mean “completely and totally in keeping with character” for as long as I can remember, then yes.
t jasper parnell
It’s “Dr. Who” and he would have had not the Daleks interfered.
JGabriel
Incertus:
Oh, poor baby. Have a few drinks and you’ll feel much better.
.
tBone
If he doesn’t show at the debate, he’ll look like a huge pussy in addition to being a carpet-bagging douchebag and a dangerously unstable drama queen. Go for the trifecta, Johnny!
Rick Taylor
Republicans in industry cannot possibly be happy about this. Rightly or wrongly, they wanted their multi-hundred-billion dollar handout, and now it looks like the conservative Republicans on the hill together with McCain are spiking it. I wonder if this will result in further fragmentation of the party?
Incertus
If Pelosi lets it come to the floor, that is. If a single Democrat votes for it, Blue Dog or otherwise, the Democrats will get the blame for it–count on that.
cleek
it’s all a game.
JGabriel
John Cole:
Yeah, but assuming an Obama presidency, how is that better than the Dems passing a workable solution without the Pugs, if need be?
Or are you contendeing that no workable solution can be passed under the current circumstances, in any event? Or that if a workable solution is passed, Obama will lose?
Or all of the above?
.
Bob In Pacifica
Has anyone discussed Eliot Spitzer’s op-ed in WaPo back in February? He took a pretty good whack at the Bush Administration’s behavior in this lending crisis, albeit this was before our current endstage.
I kinda wonder if the FBI had spent a few more agents on the Wall Street corruption instead of busting a politician for spending his own money on a call girl that maybe we would have had a better outcome.
But, of course, the reason why the Feebs went after Spitzer was precisely because he was publicly calling out the Bush Administration and the sleazy bankers.
You can find the op-ed here.
Comrade Jake
Based on what I’ve seen from Obama over the past couple of days, he is genuinely focused on arriving at a solution. He’s been interested in staying out of the way and letting his colleagues do their jobs.
The problem with developing a strategy to deal with McCain is that he’s so erratic. It’s precisely the quality that should prevent him from ever becoming POTUS in the first place.
Joshua Norton
At this point? Yes. The Repigs will call it the Bush/Obama/Pelosi bailout. They’ll be screaming the ‘tax and spend” Dems are giving all our money away one more time. And the “undecideds” will eat it up with a spoon.
Comrade PeterJ
bleed until bankruptcy.
DonnaInMichigan
Walk. A. Way.
Now.
Let the chips fall where they may…right into the republicans lap.
Ted
Yup. Even 50 Blue Dogs are enough for the Mighty Wurlitzer to paint it as a completely Democratic party bill, and the public to believe it.
Marshall
The Mandate of Heaven says that Bush will be blamed for this. Of course, he should be blamed for this, so that is gratifying. McCain could have, maybe, just maybe, escaped a share of the blame, but now he has injected himself into the process, so he will be blamed too.
Epic Fail.
Fwiffo
Palin’s “reducing taxes has to accompany tax reductions” quote from the Katie Couric interview inspired me to make an automatic Sarah Palin interview generator.
Here’s a preview:
Scott H
Lucky number 13: biggest bank failure evah.
Incertus
I think that today’s actions by the House Republicans and John McCain prove that they’re not interested in a workable solution. They’re interested in fucking the Democrats, first, last and always. They’re a goddamn cancer on the body politic.
Rick Taylor
McCain is the incredible narcissist, the candidate who thinks only he can save America, and who is therefore willing to sacrifice anything to his aspiration to be President, that he pretends Obama to be.
jenniebee
But Pelosi would still have to bring it up for a vote.
I’m in agreement though, let this blow up, then don’t even talk to the WH. Just decide on a pure Dem plan, using the Dodd plan as a starting point, add a few popular poison pills (like restructuring mortgages in bankruptcy proceedings) and then force Bush to veto it. Let Republicans explain to the country how letting people pay off their mortgages and stay in their homes hurts America.
As the great Washingtonienne once said:
wait, that’s not it… here we go:
Congressional Dems, please. It’s time, finally, to realize that you are beautiful, smart, funny, wonderful people, and dammit, you deserve lube.
Comrade Jake
You know what drives me nuts? I know, just know, that we are going to see more “stunts” like this from McCain in the weeks ahead.
I can’t take it anymore. His whole campaign insults my intelligence. The media coverage of his campaign is fucking brain-dead. This should not be a goddamn close race.
I’m just going to keep donating to Obama’s campaign and look away. I need to start really getting into college football and the MLB playoffs.
The Other Steve
I gotta call my buddy. WaMu holds his mortgages on investment properties and have been trying to foreclose.
Joshua Norton
He doesn’t even want to save America. With them it’s either Rule or Ruin.
kth
fuck it, worst case is it can wait until November 6 or thenabout, passed to Dem specs on a straight party-line vote in a lame-duck session.
BTW, at the half it’s Oregon State 21, USC 0. God let this hold up.
Comrade Jake
From a post over at Kos (so take it for what it’s worth), summarizing Barney Frank just now on CNN:
I like Pelosi’s stance there.
El Cid
Reporting on Rachel Maddow’s show that Barney Frank is announcing that the Republicans have walked out.
gbear
I’m sure that Barney Frank, Chris Dodd and Pelosi are all pissed off enough to do the Depends-stuffing, and Obama is still making all the right moves in a non-flustered way.
The facts of how much of this bailout is necessary is beyond me, but I’ll assume that by this time that compromise committee has a pretty fair idea of the realities involved. I don’t think they’re going to be railroaded by McCain’s ignorant grandstanding, and I think that ‘cancelling’ his campaign plus the stunt that McCain pulled on Letterman last night might be the straw that breaks it for McCain’s credibility on any issue. Standing up Letterman was an incredibly, obviously, totally stupid move.
McCain: He’s toast, He’s nationwide.
Rick Taylor
While I’ve said my opinion of McCain above, I have more sympathy with the House Republicans who are pulling this. They’re crazy (now is the time for repealing the capital gains tax!), but I think they’re sincere; I don’t think it’s some trap for the Democrats (at least as far as they’re concerned). It sounds like they were never on board, the rest of the congress assuming they’d play along, and now they’re saying hell no. Via the moderate voice, Huckabee is eloqent:
I think we’re seeing the divide open up between wing-tip conservatives and the social conservatives.
Scott H
We need a good old-fashioned WWI poster of a weeping Chris Dodd holding the bloody corpse of WaMu in his arms. Rescue Came Too Late!
The Dangerman
Amen (from a UCLA grad).
For being a 25 point dog, OSU is playing lights out (or USC spent far too much time partying it up in Corvalis last night).
Comrade jnfr
This is so fucked up.
The Bag of Health and Politics
Re: The Blue Dogs: that’s how it worked in the past. When Denny Hastert had control over what went to the floor. Not so much with Nancy Pelosi running the show…
DonnaInMichigan
Wow.
All I can say is WOW.
What will happen tomorrow?
Will John McCain show up for the debates?
Will Democrats tell the Republicans to FUCK OFF?
Will Palinocchio tell another LIE?
Will the polls show Obama gaining on McCain?
Will Bill Clinton say more nice things about McCain?
Will McCain continue with his suspension of his campaign (whatever that means)or will he jump-start his campaign again?
What new stunt is up McCain’s sleeve?
Tune in tomorrow for the next installment of: While America goes to hell in a hand-basket.
Keith
At least I didn’t see a return of that ridiculous idea of cutting the capital gains tax. It took all of about 2 seconds for the rebuttal of that one: why would removing a tax on capital *gains* affect companies about to *lose* billions (capital losses aren’t taxed)?
El Cid
From Politico
…”confirmed Treasury’s fears about the decision by Bush, at the urging of McCain, to allow presidential politics into what were already difficult negotiations…”
Stuck in the Fun House
The sane thing to do right now would be for Obama and Mccain to jointly assure Wall Street they will both take steps as president, if elected, to not let the bottom fall out of the economy. That should help eleviate the contagion of fear that Paulson and Bernanke say could cause a run on the banks that would kill the economy. And yes, that is exactly what Obama tried to do when he first called Mccain.
In the meantime, something could be put together by congress as a stand by stop gap measure to infuse federal cash into the markets if needed for liquidity by the largest companies. Right now the election more than ever is squarely in the hands of the press, to accurately portray what is happening and the dangerous politics of the POW whackjob and his gang of henchmen running his campaign. The more confused these fools can make thing,s the better chance for Mcnut to win, and the country to lose.
Brian J
I could of course be wrong about this, but from what I read in this article in The New York Times, it doesn’t seem like this is a particularly shocking or awful turn of events. Because the FDIC isn’t taking it over, it won’t hurt that system, and it’s not like this was some huge shock. JP Morgan tried to get WaMu back in March, but the company thought the price was too low.
I’m curious about two things. First, what happens to specific savings vehicles that WaMu offers? Will Chase continue to give me 4.0%, even now much less in 2010? Second, on a much, much less important note, what will happen to the insane number of Chase and WaMu branches near me?
JL
The dems need to lock up by noon and tell WcCain to fuck off. After all a W is just a backward M, right? Maybe WcCain can spend his spare time looking for Vicki.
gbear
DonnainMichigan:
no
yes
same as it ever was
no
fuck Bill
will you be able to tell the difference?
I can’t think that low any more.
nicethugbert
Wish I could be so optimistic. Dear Dems, STOP HUMILATING ME! Incidentally, A Bailout We Don’t Need.
Well, it’s only television, right? Yes? No? Oh, please say it’s just TV! Aaaahhhh, O Canada, let me in, plzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz!!!!!!!
Oh, check this out: McQuasiModo. Eh? Ah? Has thump to it, huh?
Comrade Jake
OK, so let’s operate under the assumption that there’s genuine division in the Republican party. It probably only matters that this is the way it looks. One of two things seems likely to happen at this point:
1) They eventually come around, and McCain sells himself as the one who made the process happen, and gets a little “win” for leadership to an unpopular bill.
2) McCain can’t get them to do much of anything, and appears to be a feckless leader.
Is there a third option that really seems plausible at this stage? I guess some would argue here that he could champion them as a block against the bill, but I really don’t see that happening right now.
My point is that neither one of these outcomes is really all that good for McCain. Am I missing something?
Brian J
In other words, Obama acted like an adult and a president, and McCain acted like a child who isn’t fit to run for student body president–or as I like to say, business as usual?
gbear
Yea, that unity thing worked so well today.
voice of reason
McCain is a madman who must be stopped by any means necessary.
wasabi gasp
Ben better start gassing up the helicopter.
Comrade Stuck
Like a Chinese Fire Drill on Acid.
Montysano (All Hail Marx & Lennon)
Olbermann was on Rachel’s show tonight. His take? McCain’s campaign is such an unmitigated trainwreck that his only strategy is a non-stop series of stunts and drama queen moments, the purpose being to constantly change the subject and grab the headlines for good or ill. Try to kick the can down the road, run out the clock, hope for the best.
KO also opined that this stunt is really all about delaying the VP debate, an idea that crossed my mind yesterday. The Couric interview had to rattle the McCain campaign badly; it was a major disaster. I don’t know exactly what time the Couric video hit the toobz, but the McCain Fail Train may have gotten an advanced look at it and decided to run the Hail Mary.
JGabriel
Incertus:
Fair enough. I guess that’s what Cole was getting at too.
While I’m still concerned that we try to get the best deal for the next president to govern from, under the circumstances, “Walk Away” might well be the best option.
Recalcitrance is really not a good play for the GOP at this point. The majority of the public already blames them for the crisis, and since blame tends to be inertial, a failure to fix the crisis will simply leave the blame for the continuing fallout with them.
.
SAmmy3469
I’d say walk too except I think the House Reps are even crazier than McCain. In any case with the WM failure we’ll get a sneak peak of just how bad it would be without a bill.
JL
And the MSM will say WcCain was a hero and a POW.
Comrade NonyNony
Actually, the Blue Dogs don’t need to do a goddamn thing.
If Paulson and Bernanke are convinced that the House GOPers and McCain are screwing up their deal, and if they really need it, then they need to pull the Blue Dogs in the House aside and tell them that this is a goddamn stupid idea. They’re Blue Dogs – our biggest complaint about them is that they always fucking heel when their master calls, so let that work for the Dems for a change. If Paulson says the GOPer plan is bad, the Blue Dogs will stay true to their nature and stay away.
Then the plan comes up for a vote and gets a goose-egg worth of Democrat votes. If there’s a real split in the GOP between the wing-tips and the wing-nuts, then they shouldn’t get all of the House GOP votes either. The plan stops, it’s shown to be a completely partisan plan (remember – NO DEMOCRATS) and McCain is out as the great white knight.
OTOH – if Paulson suddenly decides that the GOP plan is just peachy keen then Pelosi has the nod to say “Fuck it – you guys are just full of noise”. Either way – win for Dems.
Comrade Jake
I actually think a lot of the hero/POW ship has sailed. The media hasn’t shown too much hesitance going after McCain these days.
Brian J
1. I know the debate is in less than two weeks, but they picked Palin almost a month ago. Unless she’s really an intellectual lightweight, there has to be a way for her to bone up on what she would need to score a few points and skate by relatively unscathed. If they really are trying to cancel it through backhanded moves, they fear that she’s really going to kill the campaign.
2. Perhaps this is some really elaborate rouse designed to make us speculate about this nonsense and then, when the debate actually happens, and she doesn’t piss herself on stage, the narrative will be that she’s actually not that bad.
3. No matter what they are trying to do, Obama and Biden should just campaign as they have been campaigning. If they try to stall on the debates, our guys should just act like nothing has changed and then, if they don’t show up, use the opportunity as a chance to spread their message. In other words, continue to act like the grown ups.
Rudi
Paleo-conservatove Larison’s take on McCain and the Republican response is great. It’s short, so here’s the whole thing:(Link Larison)
Go to the site and read his take on Palin, he’s not a Hewitt.
DonnaInMichigan
McCain’s Thursday Itinerary:
Sweeps into Washington about 11 am.
Walks to his Senate Office, with Joe Lieberman
Had Photo Op with the President. Smiling all through it.
Did a couple TV interviews (to be aired in the evening)
Sped off to one of his 7 mansions, while a spokesperson for his “cough” campaign “cough”,stated that McCain is optimistic about bringing house republicans on board.
Cindy of course waiting for him, with his slippers and warm milk..was all snug as a bug in his beddie, by 8 p.m.
Yea, being a 72 yr old maverick, is tiresome.
The Other Steve
I gotta agree. Just walk away.
This was a campaign stunt designed by McCain and Bush to change the subject.
JonChicago
I can’t believe the Repugs are screwing W and W’s appointees Bernanke and Paulson. This is such a huge crisis and the Repugs cannot show any unity. I think Obama and McLookatme should agree on some lesser amount as a stop gap until a partisian bill can be agreed to. What’s a short term gap? $150B? W/ additional authority. But I don’t think the Dems should fall on their sword to save Bush and make McLookatme look like he actually did something.
JL
not likely. He’ll have warm milk, but probably not by Cindy
kth
Let’s be perfectly clear: the congressional Republicans want the bill to pass, just without their votes. They want to be insulated from blame if a crash occurs, but they also want to be able to run against the bailout. But the last thing they want is for no deal to go through at all.
AS if to precisely illustrate the above point, Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL) was on Maddow this evening, saying he’s got big problems with any bailout, but the Dems have enough votes in both houses to pass a bill all by themselves. What a honking tool.
Comrade Stuck
I first thought the whole thing was concocted by the White HOuse and RNC fuckwits just to scramble the news cycle because they were losing. I don’t think that so much now, for the simple reason the economy is the wrong topic for wingnuts to do that with.
It seems to me now (maybe) that Paulson and Bernanke are genuinely scared of what might happen if the government doesn’t step in soon, although I doubt they have a clue really how bad things are and went overboard with the first proposal. The WH has actually given in to dem demands on several key points of the proposal.
However, the wizards running the Mccain clusterfuck are now taking off with the Rovian playbook chapter that says, if your losing then flame the entire process to cause voters to think it’s everybody’s fault and both sides get blamed equally, which is a win if your losing the narrative and election.
Comrade NonyNony
Hey, the “Republicans in disarray” narrative has been tooling around the blogosphere for well over a year now. The mainstream media doesn’t report on it much, but the coalition that they’ve put together of theocons, neocons, paleocons, rich bastards and moderates has been threatening to pull apart at the seams since 2006.
It doesn’t surprise me at all that the wingnut brigade is revolting against the rich bastards right now. The wingnut brigade actually believes the shit they’ve been peddling to us for the last 30 years about “free markets” and “no regulation” and how “unfettered capitalism is great for everyone.” The rich bastards know the score – unfettered capitalism is the shiz-nitz when the market is bullish, but socialism is the only way to go when the bear comes knocking at your door…
oh really
Copied from Adam Nagourney and Elizabeth Bumiller, stenographers at the NYTimes, who copied it directly from Stunt McPOW’s talking points. How utterly depressing.
JL
shelby had props also.. He had paper that signified emails from important economist from big schools like Harvard and MIT. He never said what he would do, but he did wave his paper around
gwangung
Then it’s clear. Bipartisan deal or walk.
Comrade Stuck
That may be right, but also I think the House Repubs are in a situation where it doesn’t matter if they get blamed, or not. They realize they are going to be a minority party in the House no matter what for some time to come. The young Delay disciples who rule that roost, are bidding for long term ideological purity IMO, and don’t really give a fuck about much else at this time.
JonChicago
What if Obama were to step in and create an alliance with Bush, Paulson and Bernanke and get some semblance of a bail out completed for the good of the country? Would that stick it to McCain and any Repug who decides that this crises is a political opportunity?
KT
McCain’s approach to everything problem.
Fucker needs to be locked up. I’m serious, he’s insane.
KT
McCain’s approach to every problem.
Fucker needs to be locked up. I’m serious, he’s insane.
tBone
Yes, they do. With good reason. Did you see the Palin
interviewself-immolation with Couric?Did you see the Palin
interviewself-immolation with Couric? She’d be like a frog pinned to a dissection pan in a debate with Biden.Yes. You’re missing the fact that the McCain campaign has gone bugfuck crazy. At this point they’re throwing uncooked spaghetti at the wall and then wondering why it doesn’t stick.
Glenn
The Dems. are too fucking cowardly and stupid to walk and also too bought by the same MOFO’s on wall st. most of the Rethugs are. The irony here is not all of them are. What we’re seeing here is where the $$ splits both parties. If the Dems. had any balls they’d walk away from this Bankers Bail-out. BV$H has no fucking intention of honoring any of it. He and Hank will accept any provision thats tabled just to get the fucking $$$. Then BV$H will sign the bill and promptly do one of his now famous signing statements cutting out what he doesn’t intend to honor because he has NO honor. The dems. must know his which would mean the knife in the taxpayers back has been planted by both.
dadanarchist
The DNCC and DSCC should have ads up tomorrow comparing the GOP “leadership” to Herbert Hoover.
That or ads comparing them to a petulant child whining about his “lolly.”
kth
Jon, no, that allows Congressional Republicans to run against Obama and Bush, and thus to create the illusion that they aren’t as responsible for the fiascos of the last 7 years as he is. Wingnuts like Patrick Ruffini have already fantasized aloud about running against the “Bush-Pelosi bailout”. And that wouldn’t be terrible if they were really interested in killing a large bailout, but of course they want to disown both the bailout and the crash that might occur if it doesn’t pass.
JGabriel
JennieBee:
This is America we’re talking about!
We all deserve lube.
.
Comrade Minister of Tractor Production Soylent
OT, but here’s a fresh comment over at Confederate Yankee:
Yep. What could be more patriotically American?
JL
KT, did you see Palin’s interview on CBS. WcCain sounds like a genius compared to Sarah. Things I have learned since listening to her, is after the bail out, I will be able to obtain health insurance at a lower cost. Oh more jobs too!!!!
Delia
From Ameriblog, quoting Politico:
Apparently one thing we’re seeing is that a lot of Republicans are pissed at the way the Bush team has treated them all these years and now they don’t care anymore.
JGabriel
Fwiffo:
Fwiffo, that’s so good, it’s frightening. It sounds just like her.
.
Scott H
I find three minor things interesting.
Paul Begala felt secure enough to call the President, rather baldly, “a high-functiong moron” on AC360 tonight – and nobody else on the panel uttered so much as a courtesy pull-back on the remark.
Bush-Paulson-Bernanke are having to rely on the Democratic Party leadership efforts to champion the Administration bailout.
Someone (Olberman? I am afflicted with too much channel surfing) is predicting Palin will be dropped as her benefit to the McCain campaign wanes.
BettyPageisaBlonde
Just kill me now. This whole thing makes me want to surf suicide sites.
Jeebus, could someone who knows more than I tell me when we became so stupid? Please?
gopher2b
“Meanwhile a group of House GOP lawmakers circulated an alternative that would put much less focus on a government takeover of failing institutions’ sour assets. This proposal would have the government provide insurance to companies that agree to hold frozen assets, rather than have the U.S. purchase the assets.” (from Yahoo news)
Insurance?!? Insurance?!? For free? Are you fucking kidding me. Do you know how much worse that is than buying assets at a low price.
I cannot believe this.
These guys don’t get to be free-market conservatives now. They have literally now idea what they are doing.
There will be a run on money market accounts tomorrow and Monday. I bet the market loses 5-10% tomorrow. Maybe more. Credit is going to get so tight rates are going to skyrocket.
This is the problem with electing 72 year olds to office. They don’t give a shit.
Ed Drone
If it is up to the Democrats to solve this, then let them do it the right way — drop the original plan totally, and build a process that pays the mortgages of real people (or loans ’em enough to get over the rough patches). Add in the other aspects of Obama’s position and let Bush veto it if he can’t stand it.
If the Democrats pass something like the original, so Bush won’t veto it, they deserve every bit of approbation they will get. Make the madministration take their medicine, override their vetoes, and use a truly progressive solution to this Republican crisis. Make ’em turn it down or take it. IF the crisis is truly a crisis, they will have to take it. IF they won’t, then they DON’T MEAN IT!
Comrade Ed
KT
Yep. It was like snorting ammonia while chewing aluminum foil and listening to fingernails on a blackboard.
Just Some Fuckhead
It’s kinda ironic that the party he lockstep marched off a cliff will be removing the caveat “since Hoover” from his legacy of “Worst President since Hoover”.
J. Michael Neal
I’m watching SportsCenter, and Scott van Pelt is a dead ringer for Hank Paulson. So much for using sports as an escape.
dr. bloor
The next razzle-dazzle play, after McCoward’s current round of shit-smearing abates. No doubt Palin will nobly hand over the VP slot to the Mittster in prime time, stating that his economic expertise is more urgently needed than is her wealth of foreign policy experience during these trying times.
John
Do they actually have the votes for such nonsense? I’m guessing no. I don’t see how any plan can pass that has the backing of the majority in either house or the administration (and Paulson seems to think about as little of this “plan” as we do). Even the Senate Republicans mostly seem pissed.
Furthermore, I don’t see how the Democrats can have the majority in both houses, and then use that majority to let House Republicans pass a terrible bill that everyone else opposes.
99 Percent Pure
It appears that I’m missing a lot though I’ve been diligently watching this while letting Congress know how bad the bail-out is.
I’m still trying to figure out how, if both Pelosi and Reid told Repugs unequivocally from the git-go that if a majority of them didn’t sign on to the adjusted plan before it came up for floor vote, the Dems would, essentially, walk away. So how is it bad for the Dems that the House repugs are grandstanding, thus showing that they have absolutely no leadership/support from either their president or their nominee?
In fact, Darth Cheney’s rejection by repugs (remember that?) when he appeared on Capitol Hill a couple of days ago was a strong indication that the repugs were up the creek without a paddle when it comes to leadership.
All broadcast media reports that I have seen say that there was a tentative deal until they met in the Cabinet room of the WH. Before the meeting, even Rethug Redneck Shelby said that, though he didn’t support it and had talked to 5 different economists who said that it was a bad plan, there was enough support on both sides of the aisle for it to pass. Shelby even admitted that he had yet to talk to McCain since the “crisis” first emerged last week, while Dodd and Frank and others were saying that Obama had been talking to King Henry, Prince Paul and Capitol Hill leaders since early last week.
Shelby also said that McCain added nothing to the meeting and expressed nothing worthwhile during the meeting.
McClatchey: Bush’s bailout meeting ends in disarray; McCain gets blame
So I’ve yet to figure out how this can be spun as a negative on the Dems, when the Dems are on record as saying that they had reached a tentative deal at least an hour before heading to the WH photo op. If the repugs refuse to sign on, the Dems won’t either; Frank made that clear as Dodd said “I’m going home” and headed down the stairs of the Capitol Bldg.
Like the Dems, their supporters have a great knack for snatching defeat out of the jaws of victory as well. This makes the repugs look back and the media’s calling them on it too.
WE DON’T NEED THIS PLAN! The Dems are plahing it right – offer a bipartisan plan and let the repugs turn it down. The ball is now in their court, and since they so obviously mistrust their pres and their nominee, let them turn it down. They can try to spin it any way they want to, but they’ve just proven that there was no real urgency as first perpetrated by King Henry.
THE DIE IS CAST; NEXT MOVE IS ON THE REPUGS.
JGabriel
Delia (quoting Ameriblog and Politico):
For many Americans, maybe most, I suspect the proper response to this is “Why not?”
Think about it. Productivity has skyrocketed over the past twenty years, people are working harder and harder, but their income hasn’t increased relative to inflation in two or three decades, except for a brief window during the Clinton administration. And during the Bush years, they’ve actually seen their income fall.
Meanwhile, the cost of health care and health insurance goes up while their health benefits go down and become increasingly more difficult to get even when they have insurance.
And the price of gas is over $4.00/gallon. Heating oil is going up. Electricity bills are going up.
Many of us are already in our own private recession or depression, while the profits and income of CEO’s and upper management have increased by orders of magnitude. We passed Brazil several years ago as the country with the largest income gap in the world, and the press hardly made a peep.
So why should they care if Wall St. gets bailed out? They’re already suffering – at the hands of the same people asking for our money to replace their losses.
And again, they’re already suffering. It’s not like it’s going to get much worse for them if the market crashes, or at least they haven’t any reason to believe so. Nor do they have any reason to believe that a bail-out will benefit them. And they’re right – it probably won’t.
The more I think about it, the more I think Cole’s right. The Dems should just walk away. Let it crash. Let it all fail. Let the GOP take the blame.
.
rikyrah
Did you see the Diary over at DailyKos:
CNN: Obama Tried to Rescue Meeting, McCain Was Silent
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/9/25/232644/542?detail=f
summary:
. On CNN, Paul Begala said that his sources told him that in the Cabinet Room, after Bush’s opening statements, it is customary for Nancy Pelosi, as the highest ranking from the congressional delegation to start speaking. She deferred to Obama, and he laid out to the whole cabinet, without notes, the Democratic position on the bailout bill. When he finished, everyone looked at John McCain. He fumbled and deferred to someone else. He didn’t say anything else for the 43 minutes of contentious debate that followed, until, get this, Obama called on him. He then said he wanted less regulation and corporate tax breaks. After that, the meeting adjorned, and the bailout bill was officially derailed. John McCain had the opportunity to back the bill and get something done, and he faltered and allowed everyone to say no deal.
KT
McCain’s new campaign ad
Martin
Ok, I think I have a component of this figured out better than before.
The problem *really* isn’t the defaults. In total, we’re talking about maybe $300B in defaults, and likely 2/3 of that can be recovered once the property is seized and sold.
The problem seems to be all the derivatives tied to those mortgages and the fair market valuation accounting system that we put in place to stop the kinds of shit that Enron was pulling. An example:
You hold a bond containing a bunch of mortgages that that has a maximum future value of $1M – assuming that nobody defaults. But we know that some people will default, so let’s value it at $900K as a reasonable estimate. But I’m required to value this bond according to FMV so I look on the market to see what it would sell for and I see that my $900K is correct. A month later you’re required to revalue the bond and in that time a bunch of investment banks have failed and a large insurer and there’s all kinds of doubt about whether people can afford to pay back their loans. Foreclosure rates haven’t gone anywhere, though. There simply aren’t any buyers for bonds out there. You check the market again and find that bonds like yours are only going for $500K because nobody will put cash out there without a huge return. In your accounting, the value of your bond went down $400K, even though you still expect to get $900K based on the foreclosure rate. Now you have a problem. Your balance sheet on your next earnings report is going to look terrible because you’ve written down the value of that asset as required by accounting rules. Further, you have other obligations tied to that bond that if the value of it drops by too much, you may need to put up cash to show that you can back those obligations. Finally, if your total asset base falls too far, S&P might jump in and downgrade your credit rating because you went from being leveraged 12x to 15x because your assets fell in value (even though you didn’t do anything).
Of course, in this process, you can’t afford to buy anything either because you need all your cash, and everyone else has the same problem. In theory, the market could freeze up so badly that FMV for all assets goes to zero simply because there is nobody left to buy anything. Here, nobody really needs to do anything terribly bad, they just all need to pull back on their buying a bit, which leads to more pullback, and on and on.
Now, this is why Buffet is semi-bullish, because he sees all of these guys with bonds valued WAY below a reasonable price and you could buy up this bond which is probably worth $900K for far less and hopefully if things would just loosen up, the FMV would then get back to $900K and you just made a shitload of money.
So this is what Paulson is proposing to do: Take this giant pile of money and start buying bonds not at FMV but at a reasonable price relative to what the bond should pay out. The govt. cares fuck-all about the FMV rules, so it can do this where other companies can’t afford to. Simply by being a buyer of these things, the FMV values go up to where they really ought to be, everyones balance sheets go back to where they should be, and everything ends. How much money is needed to get everything lubed up? Who the hell knows, which is why they made up the $700B number. They just keep buying until it happens at which point they can stop and let the market get back to normal. Since only $300B or so has been actually lost to defaults, my guess is they just doubled whatever number they had there and figured that should be more than enough.
Further, once the market loosens up, the portfolio they just bought up can be sold on the open market for about what they paid for it, give or take a bit. The market need to be healthy enough to do this, so it might take a year or three, but worst case the Treasury just sits on them and collects the mortgage payments and pays them off that way.
Now, what seems completely insane about the whole proposal is that the simple solution seems to be to somehow suspend the FMV rules, because basically all the Treasury is doing is using an entity for which those rules are suspended to temporarily game the market.
So, I’m increasingly becoming convinced that the plan isn’t bullshit (though there are other ways to solve it, clearly) and I’m convinced that the plan probably will work after all (though the other ways would probably work better). I even now expect that Paulson would buy these for just enough of a discount that he’d probably make a reasonable amount of money for us given what he did with AIG (we’ll make some real money off of that, BTW.)
Now, I think the Dems have an opportunity here in backing the bill to get a bunch of other good things – such as renegotiation of mortgages, and so on, so even though the bailout has weaknesses, the extra items make up for those in their view.
Looking at what McCain wants to do, I don’t see that it solves the problem at all. Not at all. Suspending tax rules won’t free up capital if they’re are concerned that the stuff they buy will fall right back to FMV of 0.
Does it solve the problem forever? No. These funds were all too over-extended and once they slipped over the inflection point there was almost no going back. There’s nothing stopping that from happening again, so a bunch of regulation needs to get out there to go along with this.
Martin
And the Beavers beat the Trojans. The world is turning inside-out.
The Dangerman
LESS Regulation? Was he fucking high? What were he and Lieberman doing in the Executive Head (on second thought, let’s not go there).
If there is any good news tonight, it’s that tomorrow’s monster market shit may signal the end of Republican power for a generation (unless, of course, having the market tank was the idea and the debate has to be cancelled – so McCain gets his way at the cost of 500 DOW points or whatever).
Comrade ninerdave
My 2 credit default swaps.
1) McCain throwing a monkey wrench into the bailout deal was the next logical step to his suspending his campaign, which really means he doesn’t (or more likely doesn’t want Palin) to debate.
2) From what I can tell, the bailout needs to happen. Maybe not to the tune of 700B, but (as we see with WaMu) there are some serious problems in the market. The market needs to be stabilized before:
3) We fix the root cause….shit mortgages. Until that’s taken care of…e.g. the root cause…we just throw good money after bad.
Of course, I don’t expect #3 to be resolved until Obama gets into office, and the Dems realized this too.
Comrade FLILF Hunter
Repo Man is always a good source of wisdom at times like this. To wit: “There’s some bad shit coming down, kid.”
This morning I woke up with bank accounts at Washington Mutual. Tonight I go to sleep with bank accounts at JP Morgan Chase.
Who’s next in the Dead Pool? And what does McCrash do when the bottom falls out of the market tomorrow?
oh really
Oh, come on. That must have been copied (and adapted) from Mein Kampf. It may be the only “Amerikan” thing left to do, but it’s certainly not an original idea.
Martin
Well, technically, suspending the FMV rules would be less regulation. But I don’t think this is what they are referring to. And the rules don’t need to be rid of, just changed to give funds a different, non-arbitrary way to value a bond (for mortgages, based off of current foreclosure rates, maybe.)
I don’t think that’s the root problem, just the catalyst. In total, they don’t really add up to all that much money from what I can tell. I mean, they don’t /help/ things, but I don’t think they are really the problem.
jcricket
A little commented on detail of WaMu failing is the fact that the guy who’s been CEO for 3 weeks is gonna walk with $20 million (search for “Fishman”). Nice work, if you can get it.
Good deal for Dimon and his crew at JP Morgan. They took a couple of billion dollar baths on mortgages in the last couple of years, but nothing existentially damaging. They waited around, and pick up WaMu’s massive assets for basically nothing ($2 billion in cash, $36 million write-down). JP Morgan cannot be sued by any WaMu “shareholders” or “bondholders” as all that responsibility stays with WaMu’s holding company which is in receivership (holdin all sorts of unsecured debt and what-not, so it’s totally worthless). $7 billion from TPG wiped out, stock holders wiped out, employee shareholders wiped out. This is gonna pay huge dividends for JP Morgan for the next 20 years. Amazing.
As much as it pains me, as a Seattleite who works near the WaMu HQ, my prediction is that most of the 4,000 HQ jobs will go in the next couple of years, while most of the branch jobs will stay. Another big corporate loss for Seattle. With Boeing gone, Weyerhauser a shell and Safeco now part of Liberty Mutual we’ve got, what, amazon and microsoft left? Depressing.
jcricket
Back on topic, Republicans, abandon ship, abandon ship! Flee for the exits! Trample over anyone that gets in your way :-)
This is basically what’s happening in DC. All the factions are jockeying for their ideology to win, and I don’t think McCain’s gonna be seen as some big hero. Too much unpalatable medicine for every Republican to swallow, no matter what gets passed.
The Dems need to be pushing the “Republicans in chaos” and “McCain mucking up the works” memes. Throw in a little “McCain’s a little pussy for trying to hide from the debate” and “McCain crawls into corner, sucks his thumb and curls up with his blankie”.
They’re on the ropes, so now is the time to hit them again, and again, and again and again. That’s how Obama wins by 15%.
Comrade FLILF Hunter
Jesus-financial-meltdown-christ… The comments on that thread are lurching toward gallows erection with swinging Republicans.
Personally, I prefer a well-polished guillotine.
Teak111
Something is wrong with McCain!!! Gotta be. He’s had a stroke (God forbid) or something. That’s why the debate is cancelled or might be, that is why he said nothing in the cab meeting.
Comrade ninerdave
FLILF Hunter blows goats…
…no seriously I know him personally and he does it.
…just sayin’
Comrade FLILF Hunter
Dunno if that’s the reason, but it looks like there’s only one bail-out plan McCain wants to implement.
Comrade FLILF Hunter
You’re just jealous cuz your own goats reject your advances.
JGabriel
NinerDave:
I find it pretty hard to get worked up over accusations like this.
I mean, seriously, goats can kick pretty hard. Unless the guy is covered with hoof marks, I think we have to assume the goat fellatio is consensual.
And in that case, it’s really none of our damn business.
.
AJ
The Republican Plan – why it is a total joke. (courtesy of the Curious Capitalist blog)
http://time-blog.com/curious_capitalist/2008/09/the_republican_alternatives_to.html
Curious Capitalist: [The plan] of the House Republican Study Committee seems to be a joke. It calls for a two-year suspension of the capital gains tax to “encourag[e] corporations to sell unwanted assets.” But the toxic mortgage securities clogging up bank balance sheets are worth less now than when they were acquired. Meaning that no capital gains tax would be owed on them anyway. If you repealed the tax, banks would have even less incentive to sell them because they wouldn’t be able use the losses to offset capital gains elsewhere. Seriously, where do these people come up with this stuff?…
Comrade ninerdave
yeah there is one bail out plan….McCain for all his POW POW POW is a fucking pussy. He can’t debate Obama and god forbid Palin goes up against Biden. I mean we’ve seen how she does against the traditional media.
McCain=pussy.
nicethugbert
I suspect McCain will want to debate now that he has gotten the credit for having torpedoed The Great Wall Street Welfare Program of 2008(notice the spin here).
If it comes to light that there is any possibility that a change in law could have freed some money to flow again, then, he will never stop crowing about deregulation(again, spin).
He was not at the White House today to work with Obama or the Dems. He was there to set them up, to waste their time, and derail their schedule. At the debate, he would be perfectly willing to share details of his “plan” because there it is not cooperation, but a weapon that he can use to gut Obama’s campaign.
All the McCain buzz words can easily be strung together with his actions to give the impression he wants and elicit the emotional response he wants, and cover any reality that contradicts it just by repeating it without end.
I hope McCain fails.
Comrade FLILF Hunter
Hey, no harm no foul. NinerDave has a drinking problem, so I’m inclined to cut him slack.
Just sayin’.
Comrade ninerdave
JGabriel: thirty lashes upon you..
I am COMRADE Ninerdave
Rick Taylor
I may have been overly hard on McCain; at least some our saying now he didn’t endorse the House Republican plan just acknowledged it. So it sounds like this schism would have happened whether or not he came back.
Mnemosyne
Personally, I prefer a well-polished guillotine.
I was Madame Defarge last Halloween. One year too early, I guess.
Joshua Norton
Oh please. Henry II didn’t actually tell anyone to murder Thomas Beckett, but the deed got done anyway.
It’s good to be the king.
Comrade FLILF Hunter
Maybe this year we should all go as executioners.
bago
W0000! There goes my bank!
Martin
No, the *GOP* confirmed that they had an agreement in the morning. McCain shows up, suddenly the house GOP develop a problem with the plan, the first anyone hear of the problem is in the White House meeting, and McCain endorses *nothing*. He still hasn’t taken a stand on anything here, just urged rapid action and opposed stuff. If he has an idea, let’s hear it. If it is the House GOP plan, okay, but the WH have already said that it won’t fly.
McCain came into town, looked for an opposing position, gave it a voice, and is now partly running out the clock and partly looking for something that he can champion, or, worst case, continually run interference on.
But watch to see Palin sit out the debate next week because there still isn’t a bill signed. That’s why McCain had to suspend the campaign – it takes the VP out of circulation as well since she had no excuse to occupy her that day. I now expect that McCain will drag this out into next week. I’m not sure how much rope he can get from his fellow republicans – they more than democrats need to hit the campaign trail ASAP.
Martin
Oh, and I should make perfectly clear, I think this is just an elaborate ploy to get Palin to duck out of her debate. It’s was clear on Wed after the Couric interview (with notes – just learned that she that she had her notes in her lap) Palin is going to get massacred and that they’ll take less polling damage if she doesn’t show than if she does. All of this is just a way to give her cover. Had Obama agreed to move their debate to the VP time, we’d have a bailout right now – I have no doubt of that. Since he turned that down, McCain will have to fuck with the economy for about a week.
And as McCain pointed out again, it’s all Obama’s fault for not doing the town halls. Or something. Whatever it is, it’s not McCain’s fault. He’s the Hero Guy™.
r€nato
I wish more Americans would follow this inside-baseball stuff.
It all points to McCain being completely unfit for the office. Is this how he would handle our foreign relations? Jesus. He could take a minor skirmish over Kashmir and turn it into nuclear war between India and Pakistan.
McCain – rash, cynical and impulsive under fire
Obama – cool, consensus-building and methodical
it’s there for all the world to see, is anyone besides us politics nerds paying attention???
JGabriel
From Politico:
House Republicans grumble that Bush is “trying to tear up the Constitution”?
Irony, meet new definition.
.
r€nato
I’m sure somebody somewhere – particularly a libertarian-tard – could make an argument that there’s something unConstitutional about this bailout. But frankly I can’t imagine what it would be. It’s entirely within Congress’ powers to loan or flat-out give money to certain industries. They’ve been doing it for a long, long time. How is this any different? There is nothing in the Constitution that says, ‘laissez-faire, bitches!’
On the other hand, you don’t have to be a Constitutional scholar to understand that warrantless domestic spying is un-Constitutional, suspending habeas corpus is un-Constitutional, violating the Geneva Conventions is un-Constitutional, torture is un-Constitutional… the list goes on and on.
Sounds to me like they are warming up for their re-discovery of the importance of strictly adhering to the Constitution, which will happen right around January 20, 2009 right after Obama is sworn in.
JGabriel
Rick Taylor:
You were NOT too hard on McCain. Here’s what happened:
So, you see, this wasn’t just McCain acknowledging the House Republicans; it was McCain throwing a monkey wrench into the works at the last possible moment he could do so.
AnneLaurie
Horrible thot… what if this is all a Republican Magic Trick to retire Old John and Sarahcuda in favor of the *new!improved!now with extra enzymes!* Hucksterbee/Willard Romney ticket?
JGabriel
AnneLaurie:
Extremely unlikely. For starters, they’d have to hold a new convention (Democrats had to hold a mini-convention in ’72 just to replace Eagleton with Shriver for VP), and there’s not much time for that.
So you can probably put that fear to rest.
.
Calouste
Where did you read that?
Not that I am surprised. When watching the interview I noticed her looking down and generally looking away quite often.
Martin
In one of the interview clips (I can’t seem to locate it now) the camera is farther back showing both of them facing each other and you can see them in her lap and she’s looking down at them at a point when she’s clearly run out of words.
Steve V
I’m leaving this comment without reading everything upthread so forgive me if I’m repeating something something that’s already been said, but I was listening to Limbsugh this morning and he was saying that the “conservative” solution to the problem would be to eliminate all capital gains taxes and corporate taxes for a year or two until everything’s better. Putting aside the fact that this is Grover Norquist’s wet dream and, if passed, would appear to represent the ultimate checkmate of hardcore conservativism against our modern society, this appears to be the type of approach, in general terms, that McCain spoke favorably of in that White House meeting today. If it’s true that that’s what McCain backed, this means basically that McCain went to Washington to basically align himself with a position that has no practical chance of being implemented, presumably only to bolster his bona fires with the hard right (and preserve his ability to trash anything that acually gets passed).
Bedlam UK
Personally I love how Obama has handled himself so far these last few days.
How I understand it;
McCain calls to suspend the campaign, Obama makes him look foolish for being unable to multitask.
McCain calls for a meeting which he gets. Obama stands in the middle making things work and getting the Dems in line, even pissing off a few of his own when asking to not waste time fighting over Mortgage amendments.
McCain says nothing, then disparages the work, cant get the Rethugs in line and pisses off pretty much everyone.
Then Obama states that if McCain doesn’t show up on Friday, he’ll go ahead anyway and either open the event up for a one on one question time, or a ‘townhall’ q&a event.
McCain gets stuck with either allowing Obama a free hour with the American public, or being forced to do the debate, where his so-called strongest subject ‘foreign policy’ will obviously be overshadowed by dems strongest area – the economy.
So now McCain HAS to do the debate, which means he cant delay the VP debate where Palin will destroy herself.
Excellent Political gaming.
Bravo Obama.
As for the economy, I thought that we over here were out of the woods. Uh uh, we’re going down too. big time. and its only gonna get worse.
So fingers crossed you guys work out some kind of deal as without it our economy crashes too, rather than just being a big pile of shit.
The Grand Panjandrum
So let me get this right. Ceo get Golden Parachutes. Working stiffs get golden showers? Right. Now I get it.
DBrown
Lets see – middle class gets golden shower from bushwhack caused by Iraq (nearly a trillon already and two more trillon on us and kids) and only now are people asking questions about debt? What AO’s.
El Cid
The best bits of Bill O’Reilly’s anti-right-wing-radio rant:
No, I’m not making that up.
Rick Taylor
I remember way back when Bush won the election in 2000, Republicans like to say the adults were going to back in charge. I didn’t understand that then, and it makes less sense now.
Lish
Bush is Lucy, setting up the political football.
The Congressional Democrats are Charley Brown, moronically convinced they have no choice but to once more try and kick the ball.
But this time, instead of Bush snatching the ball away, it’s McCain who intercepts the play, grabs the ball and runs with it to the opposite goal line.
The score: Bush and the Democrats look like a losing “team” while McCain boasts of saving the taxpayers’ $700 billion.
And Reid, Pelosi, and Frank are once again revealed to be capitulating tools.
milo
Go on, put up a picture of Jeb Hensarling. I think all Republicons should have to declare their desire to buy insurance from Jeb.
Comrade Scrutinizer
If this is true, it’s not so bad that Palin had notes—heck, I have notes when I’m doing lectures and presentations—it’s that she’s still so fucking bad at this, even with notes.
NonyNony
I’m with you up until the last point, but it look to me like McCain is instead grabbing the ball and running with it into his opponent’s goal.
“Own goal” as it were. If there were a way to look LESS presidential in response to a crisis this week, it would be hard to see what it might be. And if McCain really ends up backing a plan that says “Less Regulation And Tax Cuts for Banks!” then he’s going to get pummeled. Just pummeled. His base may eat that crap up with a spoon, but people who are pissed off about a government bailout aren’t going to be any less pissed if they hear that the banks are getting a tax cut and free reign to keep it up. That’s not fake populism we can believe in, my friends, it just isn’t.
Comrade Stuck
I don’t know, but I did notice his left eye and side of face was drooping noticeably when he announced his intentions to forgo the debate today.
Comrade Scrutinizer
O guddie! We kan haz Kariboo Barbee?
comrade sparky
mmmm
i love the smell of fail in the morning.
to wit: there’s no way the general non-attention-span public will see this as anything other than politics by the Rs. can anyone say “impeachment” or “shutting down the government”?
comrade sparky
moderation?
for 4 ms? what’s up with that?
i ‘pose i should be happy ‘taint eaten.
/get off my lawn!
wasabi gasp
Bush plans to make statement on bailout negotiations at 9:35 a.m. EDT.
Dork
But this time, instead of Bush snatching the ball away,
I understand none of your analogy. How do you intercept a field goal attempt? Wouldn’t intercepting already imply the ball was grabbed? And how did Reid and Pelosi “capitulate” by having McCant scuttle this pact? WTF?
Marshall
TREX came to the same conclusion, and actually posted the Left Bank video.
Comrade Scrutinizer
Sounds like bleed-through from the GOS to me.
Marshall
My understanding is that the debate commission cannot do that. It’s both, or none. On the other hand, all the press will be there, so I bet something can be worked out – maybe he does a town hall out in the warm Mississippi night.
Cernig
Cantor’s “insurance” plan is a con job relying on common ignorance about insurance to push a plan that is actually functionally worse than the one it would replace while having almost exactly the same long-term costs to the taxpayer, only disguised in the short term for the GOP’s political advantage. “Look how much we saved taxpayers!”
comrade chopper
we can’t handle a bailout of that magnitude!
in seriousness, from bloomberg:
dun-dun-duuuuuuuun!
comrade chopper
will no one rid me of this meddlesome bailout package??
John
This is completely false. The Republican National Committee could meet and endorse a new VP candidate – which is what happened in 72.
Chris Johnson
My god. Who knew that Bill O, of all people, could have a Tweety Moment?
That’s absolutely what that was. Just like when Chris Matthews went off on the guy for not knowing what Chamberlain did, because Chris knows enough history to have half a clue on the matter. Now Bill O’Reilly is off the reservation as well, but for him, it’s because he loves the right wing as long as they are making him rich, but the instant that it’s clear that their bumbling ineptitude is going to cost him huge sums of money, the man is outraged to the core of his being.
For Tweety- blind ignorance of history and using words wrong.
For Bill O’Reilly- trainwrecking the economy and blowing away his investments on an epic scale.
I wonder who else is going to end up having a Tweety Moment, and on what grounds?