Posted on 10/05/2008 2:20:37 PM PDT by hecht
If McCain Doesn't Want to Talk Fannie and Freddie, Why Is He Running?
Palin is bringing up Barack Obama's long connection to William Ayers... okay.
I don't doubt that not enough Americans know about Obama and his ties to Ayers, and what an unrepentant domestic terrorist and SOB Ayers is. But that message is going to come up against a media that is hostile, determined to downplay the ties and/or willing to lie. (What the heck got into CNN lately? The past few weeks, they're getting things 180 degrees flat wrong, again and again, about easily verifiable facts and the mistakes always benefit Obama. When all the mistakes point in the same direction, one suspects they're not really mistakes.)
But I cannot emphasize enough how much the Campaign Spot's readership is yearning for the Republican nominee to lay out the various ways that Democrats on Capitol Hill aided and abetted the mismanagement and risky gambles at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Atrocious management at Fannie and Freddie isn't the sole reason for our financial mess, but it's a big one. And there were certain voices in Congress, generally on the right, who saw it as risky, and a lot of loud voices on the Hill, generally on the left, insisting that nothing was wrong.
The RNC web ad is a pretty good start, but how many will see it? (About 155,000 so far, in an electorate that will be measured in the tens of millions, probably considerably more than 2004's 122 million.) Can the 1:30 version be cut down and put on television? Why can't John McCain and Sarah Palin make the points about the how the crisis was built illustrated in the "Burning Down the House" (with the revised music) YouTube video? Could McCain please, please bring up some of this in Tuesday's debate?
Don't the American people deserve to know that Democrat Barney Frank, the ranking member and now chairman of the House, said, “I want to roll the dice a little bit more in this situation towards subsidized housing”? Isn’t the fact that the ranking Democrat in charge of oversight of Fannie Mae was in a sexual relationship with a high-ranking Fannie Mae executive a glaring conflict of interest ? Isn’t it worth noting that Democratic Rep. Maxine Waters insisted, “we do not have a crisis at Freddie Mac, and in particular at Fannie Mae, under the outstanding leadership of Mr. Frank Raines”? Shouldn’t the American people know that Democratic Rep. Gregory Meeks insist that “there's been nothing that was indicated that's wrong with Fannie Mae”?
If nothing else, shouldn’t we salute Democratic Rep. Artur Davis for saying, “Like a lot of my Democratic colleagues I was too slow to appreciate the recklessness of Fannie and Freddie. I defended their efforts to encourage affordable homeownership when in retrospect I should have heeded the concerns raised by their regulator in 2004. Frankly, I wish my Democratic colleagues would admit when it comes to Fannie and Freddie, we were wrong.” (His statement also criticized Republicans for lax regulation of Wall Street.)
One has to suspect that Obama's ties to Wright, Rezko and Ayers — sounds like a law firm of evil — have persuaded just about all the voters that they're going to persuade. But Americans are furious over the financial mess, and eager to blame somebody. The McCain campaign would be doing the nation a service by spelling out exactly whose bad decisions helped get us into this mess and how.
The excuses given by an unnamed source to U.S. News and World Report will not fly, and Spruiell's objections are spot-on. I might even be harsher - does McCain want to be president and lead on all issues, or does he just want to handle the easily-explained issues? If John McCain doesn't feel that the Democrats' refusal to confront mismanagement of government-backed institutions that gambled and lost, requiring a massive infusion of taxpayer dollars, isn't worth making an argument about, then you might as well let Obama have the presidency.
(And ever since the convention speech, I've gotten several e-mails a day, with many readers saying, "Since you're in a position to suggest lines to Palin's team, why don't you tell her to say, 'blah blah blah.' Some are great, some are okay, and some are dreadful. But I haven't forwarded any, and don't plan on doing so, since my job is to write about the campaigns instead of writing for them. I'd urge readers to use their best lines themselves.)
McCain Lied.
“this Fannie/Freddie thing is too complicated, and it returns the conversation right back to the economy which is Obama’s turf.”
I disagree. It’s not too complicated for SNL to blame the DEMS.
http://www.nbc.com/Saturday_Night_Live/video/clips/c-span-bailout/727521/
People will blame Bush for the economy and therefore McCain UNLESS he works VERY HARD at voter education. There is no indication whatsoever that he has any interest in this at all.
McCain is alienating my white @$$
amen. amen and amen
“Hit the trillion in spending, raising taxes during a recession”
I got news for you buddy. You just got a tax increase of 850 Billion Dollars.
You must not understand how large of a bill they just passed, or living in lala land.
The Iraq/Afgan war to date has cost about 10 Billion Dollars
The House and Senate just passed and the president signed a bill that is 85 X THE COST OF THE ENTIRE IRAQ WAR TO DATE,
I would not be holding my breath waiting on a tax cut anytime soon.
In fact, You just got a mega tax increase and don’t even know it.
1. McCain doesn’t understand it well enough to explain it.
2. He got campaign contributions from Fannie Mae.
3. He’s losing this election by yelling “Ayers” constantly when voters don’t care - they do care about their savings going down the drain and blame Republicans Bush/McCain for it.
Fine, if you want to piddle away the last month of the campaign talking about obscure historical details about mortgage companies, be ready for an Obama landslide. I’d rather concentrate on Obama’s crystal clear radical idealogy (as evidenced by his associations) and its dangers.
McCain needs to explain to the American people how we got into this sub-prime mess to begin with. He has done a very poor job explaining it so far, blaming it on Wall Street Greed.
Is McCain that clueless? Let’s hear more about the CRA and Fannie Mae and the way the Democrats forced banks to lend to those with low incomes and bad credit.
I agree with you. McCain can’t afford to be a one trick pony anymore. Many people do not understand the economy.
Character does count when picking a POTUS, McCain has to come at Obama from more than one angle at a time to keep Obama and his minions off guard and trying to defend on more than one subject.
Clusterf***!
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