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annie13
 Posted:
Fri Sep 26, 2008 7:14 am |
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McCain Didn't Bother to Read the Bailout Plan?
http://blogs.tnr.com/tnr/blogs/the_plank/archive/2008/09/25/mccain-didn-t-bother-to-read-the-bailout
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bnsNOEgp-_o
McCain Didn't Bother to Read the Bailout Plan?
Here's John McCain talking about the proposed financial bailout, during an interview with a local television station from Cleveland. The Obama campaign is sending the video around, and I can see why. Pay particular attention to the final few seconds, when McCain says he hasn't had a chance to read the actual proposal.
I assume he's referring here to Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson's proposed bailout. But it's possible he's referring to the alternative package Senator Christopher Dodd crafted. The context isn't entirely clear.
It doesn't really mater, though. Text of both were widely available on Monday. (The Paulson plan was available over the weekend.) And this interview, according to the YouTube page, took place on Tuesday.
Assuming that's all correct, how could McCain not have found time to read it? How could he not have made time to read it?
Remember, this is the same man who just announced he's suspending his campaign, because the financial crisis demands his full attention and participation.
Update: The McCain campaign has confirmed to Politico that the reference was to the Paulson plan--that is, the proposal Paulson made available on Friday, four full days before this interview took place. Oh, did I mention that the Paulson plan is all of three pages long?
--Jonathan Cohn
Posted: Thursday, September 25, 2008 11:58 AM with 15 comment(s)
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epicciuto said:
I hope SERIOUS hay is made of this.
September 25, 2008 12:31 PM
drdannyu said:
I am at work right now. It is because I am work right now that I am refraining from doing what I think is the only reasonable response to all of this. That is, to jump repeatedly up and down and scream at the top of my lungs.
OK, Chan. Or anyone. Anyone at all. Tell me how this doesn't just completely demolish any possible justification for McCain's recent stunt. Or, frankly, his whole goddamned campaign. Oh, and watch Palin's interview with Couric. Then tell me, with intellectual honesty, that these people deserve to occupy the White House. Tell me why. I'm dying to know.
September 25, 2008 12:44 PM
Rhubarbs said:
Hey, now, before you jump on McCain, at the time of the interview, he had only had between sixty and twenty hours to read the bailout plan.
The two-page bailout plan.
So, like, look in the mirror and ask if you have the time or the ability to read two pages in the course of one or two or maybe two and a half days before you go on national TV to lecture people about those two pages. And these aren't any normal two pages. These are two pages with very tiny margins, almost single-spaced. So look in that mirror before you criticize someone else for not making the time to read a two-page document.
September 25, 2008 12:52 PM
jfelliott said:
Epic. GOP. Fail.
September 25, 2008 1:01 PM
icarusr said:
The point is not what the plan actually SAYS, the point is the VEHEMENCE with which it is denounced. Just as McCain's forceful and "manly" and decisive pronouncement on the firing of Cox had nothing to do with whether in fact the President could fire Cox, but the VEHEMENCE with which McCain could denouce Cox. Just as McCain's "We are all Georgians now" had nothing to do with the actual facts on the ground or the ability of the United States, or McCain for that matter, to lend a hand to the beleaguered Georgians, but the VEHEMENCE with which McCain could denounce Russia and Palin could order the US's imaginary troops into the Caucasus.
When, as George Will said, you replace vehemence for coherence and cheap frat-boy antics for innovative policies, this is what happens.
DrDan: don't expect any of the trolls to give you the satisfaction of a coherence answer. Jacob will talk about Rezko; Eos is jacking off somewhere offline; Tep will gnaw on his issue du jour, "nonpartisanship"; Chan will denounce the Far Left Brownshirts; desmond will go on about the Executive Decision-making Capacity of the old coot; and Jackson will call us all anti-Semites. These are the known trolls; can't comment on the unknown trolls.
So it comes to this: a man who thinks all is well before admitting all is not well, proposes a course of action over which he has no authority, then tacks and proposes a course of action in respect of something he has not read, then tacks again and proposes a course of action that has nothing whatever to do with resolving the issue at hand ... he is either suffering from advanced dementia, or he is bipolar. Or he is just crazy, as indeed every shred of his record suggests.
September 25, 2008 1:07 PM
JEFF FREY said:
Ouch. The man just doesn't think things through before he acts, doesn't he?
September 25, 2008 1:08 PM
miceelf said:
When John McCain was a POW, he didn't have two pages to read. Now, don't you feel petty?
September 25, 2008 1:10 PM
icarusr said:
An ad script for Obama, to run tonight:
"The first responsibility of the President of the United States is to protect the security of the American people, and of the country as a whole. As we have seen in the past eight years, nothing else matters, when our lives and our security is at stake. I have repeatedly said throughout the campaign that I welcome a debate on who is best able to protect Americans: who has the better judgement, who has the stabler hand, who has the most even temperament, and who has the real spine, to face the challenges we face, here at home and abroad. It's a dangerous world and we cannot afford to run the country by fits and stunts. You, the American people, deserve to know who is the person fit to protect you; what is at stake, if your security in a challlenging world. I call upon Senator McCain to set aside political theatrics and to come debate me on Friday night."
September 25, 2008 1:23 PM
JEFF FREY said:
This really confirms that McCain's campaign suspension was just a stunt, doesn't it? How can anyone take that seriously given this information?
September 25, 2008 1:26 PM
Nippers said:
icarus,
Love your ad, especially "fits and stunts," a nice, punchy, alliterative phrase, plus fits suggests both short bursts of effort *and* temper tantrums. Brings to mind Yosemite Sam.
September 25, 2008 1:35 PM
luispc said:
The only way for Obama to put an end to this disgusting political gamble and to the chaos McCain has created (and simultaneously make an important political point both on the right and on the left) is to have the courage to reject this plan. Doing it BASED ON PRINCIPLE.
That will be the only thing consistent with his position contrary to the economic philosophy Republicans have endorsed these last decades. Since the philosophy behind this plan IS NOTHING BUT "SUPPLY SIDE" TAKEN TO PAROXYSM: fill Wall Streeters' pockets are filled everything will supposedly flow from there...
Taken to paroxysm since this time you won't just be filling Wall Streeters' pockets with "tax cuts". You'll be filling those pockets with tax payers' money. Money that will inevitably be spent on financial gambling, overseas investment, luxury, etc. Money that will NOT be spent on the REAL ECONOMY of REAL WORKING PEOPLE (on energy renewal, on infrastructure, on education, etc.)
THERE'S STILL TIME for Obama to reject this plan, end this charade and prevent what can only be named as a kleptocratic daylight robbery.
And if Obama doesn't do just that, Republicans will come out laughing from this story: thinking that they had the initiative, that Obama limited himself to play along and (worst of all) that he got his clean hands dirty while doing it. Everyone's hands will be dirty if this plan passes... If that happens, principle will be unbearibly compromised. Obama will have no coherent economic agenda anymore...
And if sanity prevails and this plan is rejected, relax. The sky will not fall over anyone's heads. Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Mr. Buffet, etc., etc., will know how to survive. Right now they are perfectly solvent and want to do business. And trust me: borrowers will still be obsessed with getting everyone spending away their credit cards limits.
September 25, 2008 2:02 PM
timteeter said:
Clearly this is a result of his war injuries, and anyone who brings it up will be ashamed of themselves soon.
September 25, 2008 2:04 PM
GSpinks said:
Not that there is much to add to this, but McCain's ads are still running in PA as of last night; and since his announcement he's done a Couric interview which Letterman mocked. It would seem that this interview was recorded before his pronouncement, so it does not actually ad to the list. Regardless, McCain did not shuttle himself off to Washington nearly as fast as one might have suspected for someone who suspended is presidential campaign (or who at least claimed to be suspending his campaign although in many respects it appears to be business as usual with interviews and attack ads).
September 25, 2008 2:13 PM
Wandreycer1 said:
Again: I need a drink.
September 25, 2008 2:37 PM
ironyroad said:
Maybe McCain believes mistakenly that "suspension" is one of those words like "sanction" that has two almost opposed meanings. McCain meant "I am intensifying my campaign."
September 25, 2008 3:55 PM
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