For anyone interested, I gave some rightwing reaction to McCain's campaign "suspension" here:
Super McCain to the Rescue!!!

I never, never make pronouncements like this. But: it's over. McCain just lost.

McInsane's gambit getting thrashed in the SUSA flash polls.

Palin/McCain: All flop sweat, all the time.

One word for McCain's 'offer' to suspend the debates: Bizarre.

The McCain campaign's house of cards is crumbling right before our eyes. It's being run by amateur hacks who whine and cry when when they don't get to set the rules, and by party elders who still think they can pull the wool over peoples' eyes regarding the true nature of McCain, as they did with little Georgie Bu$h.

Even the turd blossom has distanced himself from this traveling circus.

Steve, I just read something by Ramesh Ponnuru that I think is very shrewd:

But it is hard to see what McCain can do to help, and easy to see how his intervention could hurt. He brings, as he himself has admitted in the past, no expertise to the table. And won't Democrats be less likely to cooperate on a plan if doing so will help make McCain be the hero of the hour?

So McCain's move may have been a mistake on substance. It may prove to be a political mistake too: If McCain can't bring both parties together in an economic crisis after staking so much on it, won't voters draw adverse conclusions about his leadership ability? What do you think?

I think McCain ought to make Ramesh Ponnuru his chief strategist.

Has anyone offered the McCain campaign the opportunity to switch the topic to the economy. I'm sure that he has a lot to say to the folks in DC. I think he could do that through the forum of the debate.

No?

Hello... hello... Senator?

Uhhh....why were 2 postings of mine, on the "DESPERATE CANDIDATES DO DESPERATE THINGS" thread deleted? I've been posting here on and off for 5 years, and said nothing out of bounds.

[I haven't deleted anything of yours, Bruce. I'm trying to find out what happened and see if I can find them and restore them. Please accept my apology. It must be a system glitch. -Mod]

McSame's going to get spanked in the debates. even before allowing for the hotheadedness, even though he didn't do that poorly in the GOP primary debates, his goal is to minimize the political distance to Obama, and maximize the political distance to Bu$h. Obama will not let him do it.

That's why he needs to find a way to duck them, because he's ducked every hard question since the RNC.

And, I still think the FBI investigations are really there to bury evidence against the cronies.

did anybody else read about the army brigade being stationed for homeland security? i'm not usually a conspiracy theorist but i'm freaking myself out a little bit. . .w/ bush on tv tonight, the army brigade stationed for riots??? and mccain suspending his campaign. seems like too many weird news items for one day.

It's over; Exxon John may as well turn the plane toward Sedona instead of Washington...

As someone else said - here's John McCain riding to the rescue to make sure it's all being done right. He can fit it in starting Friday morning (sorry other things to do right now and don't want to miss that big event on Thursday night). Good grief. Why not postpone events because of Ike? That definitely was a catastrophe. I think Barack's point that you have to be able to do more than one thing at a time is a good one. Just heard Orrin Hatch say how this was the 'real McCain' willing to lose the election to save the country. Oh dear. Piffle! And then on Hardball the comment from the Republican that this is true maverick McCain.

maybe obama could show up in oxford friday night and debate a cardboard cut-out of mcsame.
gotta be more personable than the real thing,

* A criminal investigation has begun at the Justice Department, looking into whether fraud contributed to the collapse of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Lehman Brothers, and AIG.

Oh really? I'm sure Mukasey will get right on that and can be trusted to be unbiased and thorough. Feh.

Quote of the Day, in response to McCain's stunt this afternoon: "If you were wondering how bad McCain's pollster was telling him things are, there's your confirmation."

I said in another thread, if someone were to publish McCain's internal polling from this race in book form, I'd buy it for the sheer entertainment value.

Well, I'm glad Congress seems to have come to its senses in rejecting the Bush/Paulson proposal (I wonder if Bush would dare veto it). Maybe McInsane will make the debate after all.

And, yes, the election is over.

Why is CNN still pretending that McCain came up with the idea to go back to DC? Oh, yeah, never mind. The most trusted name in news - not counting Comedy Central.

Steve Benen noted: "A criminal investigation has begun at the Justice Department, looking into whether fraud contributed to the collapse of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Lehman Brothers, and AIG."

No bailout.

And no bail.

I wonder if their plan all along was to ask for $700 billion and then meeking "settle" for a mere $150 billion interim amount and a lot of regulation? Wouldn't put it past them, the bastards.

Just a side thought about what would happen to Todd Palin if god-forbid McCain won in November. He's used to being "the Dude" sitting at his wife's side bestowing his unelected strength and wisdom to the fragile office holder. But just let her get to the White House and I bet he'd get instantly muscled aside by the real pros and told to go do something to a moose. Or something.

It would be so not worth it to see this happen but sure fun to speculate on.

Alaskans are really unhappy with Gov. Palin. Sorry to say that I can't travel to Anchorage for this. However, my wife and daughter may be there.

Hold Palin Accountable Rally

Saturday, September 27th, Noon - 2:00 pm

Downtown Park Strip between I and L Streets, and 9th and 10th.

Main Stage at the Veterans’ Memorial, east end of the park.

Join your Alaskan neighbors in demanding that:

Gov. Palin uphold her promise to us for an “open, honest & transparent� government.
Gov. Palin uphold her promise to us to cooperate fully with the independent investigation as initiated by the bi-partisan Legislative Council.
We, the People of Alaska, also

Demand the immediate resignation of Attorney General Talis Colberg.
Demand the McCain campaign immediately remove itself and its influence from our state and local government.
Demand the McCain Campaign ends its attorney, Ed O’Callahan’s unlawful intrusion into our Department of Law.

Great suggestion, Mellowjohn. In fact, Obama should show up with two cardboard cut-outs of McCain, and work his way through all of McCain's flip-flops, giving one cut-out one McCain position, the other cut-out the opposite McCain position, ask the cut-outs which version of reality they wish to go with, and then proceed to summarize his own ideas on the issue and why they are better than either of McCain's.

I WANT CHICKEN SUITS! Where are the chicken suits at Palin-McCain rallies? When George H.W. Bush at first refused to debate Bill Clinton in 1992, a guy showed up at one of his rallies in a chicken suit. Soon after, more chicken suits appeared around the country, and Bush soon knuckled under. Wouldn't Palin be forced to give real interviews and host a real press conference if chicken suits (ideally, with lipstick) started following her around? Admittedly, it would have to be women wearing the suits, since it wouldn't be seemly for men to call a woman chicken. But there are a lot of women who don't like Palin. I WANT CHICKEN SUITS!

First dibs:

McMeltdown®
McMeltdown™

Please see my lawyer for licensing...

Now Pops wants to delay the fucking debate 'til 10/2. Panic is setting in.

McCain or not, on with the debate! Obama gets the whole time slot and 100 million viewers! Maybe they should put a rubber chicken in the empty chair.

Great. Dinner at the White House will go from Tex-Mex to McMeltdown sandwiches. Sounds delicious!

"I WANT CHICKEN SUITS!"

You got it Champ!

The John McChicken Dance

A store clerk told me he is only voting for Obama because Palin is so horrible with animals--he saw a photo of the ariel hunting of wolves, it appears.

I think this is the October surprise, and it's brilliant. Almost everyone is shouting about the sky falling down, that something has to be done. Therefore, the Democrats will cave in to a Wall Street giveaway, because if they don't, they can't go home and campaign. This is a "national emergency" the CW goes, so they must do something. They haven't time to call Bush's bluff. It's too late. Even if the public doesn't like this deal, they will demand that Congress stay in session and pound out the terms of the right deal. And nobody will do that. They all want to go home and campaign. They're going to pass this monstrosity.

So Bush wins again. We enact something hastily, probably unnecessarily, and almost certainly damaging to the ordinary taxpayers because it's yet another supply side giveaway to the wealthy.

This guy Bush, for all his faults, wins every time. He needs this for his legacy - something that says he came up with a plan to save the American economy in the 11th hour, and history will prove that the economy didn't descend into another depression, so Bush wins. Even though it's not going to tank if we don't do anything.

Brilliant political strategists, they are.

By delaying the debate until Oct 2 the VP debate would have to be canceled, isn't that just what he wants so that she cannot make any gaffes. Her affair is pretty well confirmed in the tabloids today, in fairness to John Edwards, I think this should be widely covered.

A store clerk told me he is only voting for Obama because Palin is so horrible with animals--he saw a photo of the ariel hunting of wolves, it appears.

In addition, the Humane Society made their first presidential endorsement ever, endorsing Obama while citing Palin's terrible record. I had a post on this yesterday at Liberal Values, which includes the statement from the Humane Society and a link to a previous post with an ad which describes her hunting.

http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=4711

Via HuffPo:

McCain's $5,000 Makeup: Will There Be Backlash?

Killer pull quote from the comments:

You people need to snap out of it - some call it "make up" but in the trade WE call it EMBALMING. There's a difference.

So, the electoral-vote.com has this tasty morsel today:

The Republican Party platform adopted 3 weeks ago explicitly opposes government bailouts of private companies. Here is the exact quote (from the section "Rebuilding Homeownership"):
We do not support government bailouts of private institutions. Government interference in the markets exacerbates problems in the marketplace and causes the free market to take longer to correct itself. We believe in the free market as the best tool to sustained prosperity and opportunity for all.

I'm not a popcorn fan; may I have peanuts instead?

Via Calculated Risk, a link to some cogent video:

In Their Own Words: Paulson, Bush, Bernanke in 2007

And these guys are still calling the shots?

Those SUSA flash polls are fascinating. McCain seems to have totally missed the mark with this stunt if initial reactions are any indication.

Who is really running the McCain-Palin campaign...Crusty the Clown or Bonzo the chimp?

Be sure to watch Letterman tonight, or check the clip tomorrow.

He reams McCain for canceling a scheduled appearance - due to his feigned sense of urgency to return to D.C - then finds out McCain is being interviewed by Katie Couric... a block down Broadway...

Re systems glitch - Ok, paranoia set aside then. Thanks.

To be fair, Steve, the woman on Salon said she worked for BOTH CAMPAIGNS, though she did not specifically mention being an astroturfer for both.

It's the duopoly, you know.

fldem,

I saw it in the Army times and it scared the shit out of me, especially after what we saw in St. Paul. It doesn't surprise me - the Bush Administration doesn't believe in the Constitution, so why should a little thing like the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 bother them?

Here's the links to Democracy Now and the Army Times article:

http://www.democracynow.org/2008/9/22/headlines#10

http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/09/army_homeland_090708w/

And Posse Comitatus for Dummies:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posse_Comitatus_Act

The last 8 years have made me very itchy for a good old-fashioned Revolution complete with guillotine.

Treasury Secretary Paulson must be really desperate to help out his multi-millionaire CEO pals at Goldman Sachs, as well as at other Wall Street firms, for him to lie the way he did at the congressional hearing, playing dumb about Section 8, repeatedly claiming he's for oversight even though Section 8 denies any oversight.

(NOTE: In bygone U.S. Army terminology, Section 8 referred to someone being discharged from service for being mentally unfit or for displaying character traits deemed undesirable. Wow, what a coincidence!! The Section 8 designation was split into Section Bush and Section Cheney, respectively. Would I lie?).

Anyway, I trace this entire Republican-created Wall Street fiasco back to Bush's "ownership society" scheme.

I bet that there is a study somewhere (probably compiled at one of the right-wing think tanks) indicating that "owners of property" tend to be more conservative and therefore tend to vote more often for Republicans instead of Democrats.

Some Republican strategist (Karl Rove?) hit upon the idea that increasing home ownership would swell the ranks of Republican-leaning voters.

This is why federal and Wall Street regulations were relaxed, making it possible for a whole lot of credit-overextended, collateral-challenged potential home owners to realize the American dream of owning a home...but with many of these people now foreclosed on or facing foreclosure.

At least that's my theory.

Now, although I know it's too late and won't help, I'm going to paint some lipstick on my piggy bank..