What Are the Answers? And Who Has Them?

And here I go with the questions again. Like I’m sure nearly everyone else, I’ve been following the downhill tumble of the Dow Jones, the defeat of the bailout and asking, ‘what’s next’?

I don’t think that there is any doubt that the next president is going to have to deal with more than one major financial crisis. Who’s ready to do that? I do agree with Paul Krugman, NYT Op-Ed Columnist, who says that Obama seems well informed and sensible about matters economic and financial. I also agree with him when he says John McCain scares him -- he scares me, too.

Maybe Obama could have shown more leadership in regards to the bailout during the debate over the bailout bill, but that pales in comparison to McCain who was frightening before and is even more so now. We know he doesn’t know much, if anything really useful, about economics – he said so himself. Of course, he denied later that he had said it, but even that wouldn’t matter if he had surrounded himself with capable, knowledgeable advisors, but he didn’t. Gramm is still around even if it’s in the shadows after his “nation of whiners” statement. How do you feel about him as Secretary of the Treasury? I don’t think so!

McCain’s views have gotten progressively erratic. He’ll have a very strong opinion one day and a short time later he will go off in an entirely different direction. He’s still declaring that “the fundamentals of our economy are strong”, and this when the financial crisis had entered a new and even more dangerous stage. He was threatening to fire the head of the Securities and Exchange Commission, which isn’t in the president’s power.

Then there was the rant about Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and claiming that Obama was under their influence, when as it turned out, the firm owned by his own campaign manager was being paid by them until last month.

In spite of the fact that Paulson’s plan was only three pages long, McCain finally admitted that he hadn’t actually read it!

You can talk tough, stomp your feet, shake your fists at the evildoers all you want, but that isn’t what is needed in the office of President of the United States!

Again, my thanks to Paul Krugman! To read his complete article http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/29/opinion/29krugman.html?ref=opinion

Did Someone Say “Clarity”?

This "season" presents each political party with so many opportunities for providing "clarity". So here are some examples.

Now I have to admit that I'm a little confused. Let me see if I have this straight.....

If you grow up in Hawaii, raised by your grandparents, you're "exotic, different."

Grow up in Alaska eating mooseburgers, a quintessential American story.

If your name is Barack you're a radical, unpatriotic Muslim.

Name your kids Willow, Trig and Track, you're a maverick.

Graduate from Harvard law School and you are unstable.

Attend 5 different small colleges before graduating, you're well-grounded.

If you spend 3 years as a brilliant community organizer, become the first black President of the Harvard Law Review, create a voter registration drive that registers 150,000 new voters, spend 12 years as a Constitutional Law professor, spend 8 years as a State Senator representing a district with over 750,000 people, become chairman of the state Senate's Health and Human Services committee, spend 4 years in the United States Senate representing a state of 13 million people while sponsoring 131 bills and serving on the Foreign Affairs, Environment and Public Works and Veteran's Affairs committees, you don't have any real leadership experience.

If your total resume is: local weather girl, 4 years on the city council and 6 years as the mayor of a town with less than 7,000 people, 20 months as the governor of a state with only 650,000 people, then you're qualified to become the country's second highest ranking executive.

If you have been married to the same woman for 19 years while raising 2 beautiful daughters, all within Protestant churches, you're not a real Christian.

If you cheated on your first wife with a rich heiress, and left your disfigured wife and married the heiress the next month, you're a Christian.

If you teach responsible, age appropriate sex education, including the proper use of birth control, you are eroding the fiber of society.

If, while governor, you staunchly advocate abstinence only, with no other option in sex education in your state's school system while your unwed teen daughter ends up pregnant , you're very responsible.

If your wife is a Harvard graduate lawyer who gave up a position in a prestigious law firm to work for the betterment of her inner city community, then gave that up to raise a family, your family's values don't represent America's.

If you're husband is nicknamed "First Dude", with at least one DWI conviction and no college education, who didn't register to vote until age 25 and once was a member of a group that advocated the secession of Alaska from the USA, your family is extremely admirable.

Oh yeah, much clearer now.

Don't forget to vote in the PBS poll -- see my earlier post. And you might want to check this one out, too. http://www.blogger.com/

This interview with Drew Westen on NOW, Obama's people should watch and learn.

This is a late addition! Take heed.
A new Lifetime TV poll -- conducted at the tail end of the Palin bubble and before last week's economic seachange -- indicates a major post-pick swing towards McCain-Palin from women who say that the GOP ticket offers a "better understanding of women and what is important to women." http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/09/22/1433515.aspx