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The debate is on; McCain agrees to participate
Published Friday, September 26, 2008
WASHINGTON (AP) — Republican John McCain agreed to attend the first presidential debate Friday night even though Congress doesn't have a bailout deal, reversing an earlier decision to delay the event until Washington had taken action to address the crisis.
With less than 10 hours until the debate was scheduled to start, the McCain campaign announced that the Arizona senator would travel to the University of Mississippi. The campaign said that afterward McCain would return to Washington to continue working on the financial crisis.
Obama had always planned to attend the debate and was aboard his plane preparing to take off when McCain's announcement was made. McCain quickly moved to his own private aircraft and headed South with his wife and former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani and his wife, Judith, on board.
The action contradicted the position McCain had taken Wednesday, when he announced, "I'm directing my campaign to work with the Obama campaign and the Commission on Presidential Debates to delay Friday night's debate until we have taken action to address this crisis."
McCain had also said he would suspend all campaign activities, but in reality the campaign just shifted to Washington while the work of trying to win the election went on.
McCain had taken a gamble with the move, trying to appear above politics and as a leader on an issue that had overshadowed the presidential campaign and given him trouble. But Democratic rival Barack Obama had not bowed to McCain's challenge, and instead questioned why the Republican nominee couldn't handle two things at once — the debate and involvement in the bailout negotiations.
An Associated Press-Knowledge Networks poll out Friday just before McCain's announcement showed the public overwhelmingly wanted the candidates to debate, 60 percent to 22 percent, with the rest undecided.
By Friday morning, it appeared McCain was looking for a face-saving way to get to the debate even though a deal had not been reached. He met with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, before heading to his campaign headquarters and issuing a statement that blamed others in Washington for the failure to reach an agreement.
"John McCain's decision to suspend his campaign was made in the hopes that politics could be set aside to address our economic crisis," the statement said. "In response, Americans saw a familiar spectacle in Washington. At a moment of crisis that threatened the economic security of American families, Washington played the blame game rather than work together to find a solution that would avert a collapse of financial markets without squandering hundreds of billions of taxpayers' money to bail out bankers and brokers who bet their fortunes on unsafe lending practices."
Just before McCain's announcement, Obama told reporters that he had spent Friday morning on the phone with Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and congressional leaders and he was optimistic that progress was being made toward a bailout deal.
"At this point, my strong sense is that the best thing that I can do, rather than to inject presidential politics into these delicate negotiations, is to go down to Mississippi and explain to the American people what is going on and my vision for leading the country over the next four years," Obama told reporters aboard his campaign plane as they prepared to travel to Mississippi.
Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, a McCain supporter, said the Republican made a "huge mistake" by even discussing canceling the debate.
"You can't just say, 'World, stop for a moment. I'm going to cancel everything,'" Huckabee told reporters Thursday night in Alabama before attending a benefit for the University of Mobile. He said it's more important for voters to hear from the presidential candidates than for them to huddle with fellow senators in Washington.
Both McCain and Obama had returned to Washington on Thursday at the urging of President Bush, who invited them to a meeting with congressional leaders at the White House. But a session aimed at showing unity in resolving the financial crisis broke up with conflicts in plain view.
McCain's campaign said the meeting "devolved into a contentious shouting match" and implied Obama was at fault — on a day when McCain said he was putting politics aside to focus on the nation's financial problems.
Democrats differed, saying the refusal of McCain and other Republicans to support the plan worked out by congressional negotiators was creating a road block.
"The insertion of presidential politics has not been helpful," Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said Friday.
When asked whether the meeting was a mistake, Obama replied, "I'm not sure it was as productive as it could have been. I think at this point it's important to just move forward."
Comments
Posted by EnKiKur (anonymous) on September 26, 2008 at 10:31 p.m. (Suggest removal)
I saw a nauseating twenty minutes of that so called debate. It wasn't a debate, it was two guys each saying how if he had been in charge the last eight years none of the bad stuff would have happened.
It appeared so stiff and childish, so far from what a debate should be, you would think the candidates are both slightly retarded. That can't be though, both of these guys have shifty, cunning eyes so the answer must that they know exactly what audience they are playing to and that their target audience will eat this playground drama up. Either that or something very like it.
I have an idea. Why don't we get two guys to pose as candidates of parties that are polar opposites and let the people choose one of them as leader every four years. That way we will know what direction public sentiment is leaning toward so we can take steps to guide the public toward what we want. Let's keep this charade up until the people are finally ready to accept that we are in charge and there is nothing they can do about it. Then, let's promise them that if they will just accept us and do as we say we won't hurt them.
Posted by broonzy (anonymous) on September 26, 2008 at 10:57 p.m. (Suggest removal)
EnKiKur,
Surprise :
http://www.epi.org/books/swa2004/news/sw...
Please stop your propaganda. We were talking not long ago about Norway. You sent on the blog a fishy link saying that Norway was far behind America on the issue of poverty. You even could ask 'what's wrong with ferriday and lake providence?"... Well, you are blind. Lake providence is the poorest city in the USA.
Also, you compared the poverty rates of USA with Norway : that is RIDICULOUS. compare Louisiana with Norway to get the picture. USA is a federation, Norway a state-nation. Buy a map.
The poverty rate in nonmetro or rural Louisiana is 24.2 percent.
The US had the highest overall poverty rate (17.0%) of the 17 OECD countries where
data was available. Australia (14.3%), Italy (12.7%), the United Kingdom (12.5%),
and Ireland (12.3%) had the next highest poverty rates after the US. Check on : http://text.lsuagcenter.com/NR/rdonlyres...
THAT IS LSU, not your Bill O'Reilly book, man !
The US had the highest child poverty rate (21.9%) and the second-highest elderly
poverty rate (24.7%). Finland (5.4%), Norway (6.4%), and Sweden (6.5%) had the
lowest overall poverty rates.
US poverty was the most persistent, with a much higher share of people who were
poor continuously over three years, according to the latest data (between 1993-1995).
At 9.5%, the US rate was over twice as high as most other countries, which range from
0.8% (Denmark) to 7.8% (Portugal).
The US had the highest rate of permanent poverty (14.5%) among OECD countries.
So please, EnKiKur, stop playing the wise guy with fake statistics. Can you challenge those REAL facts ???????
ENOUGH with lies....!
Posted by EnKiKur (anonymous) on September 26, 2008 at 11:10 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Neither of those two things you linked define poverty. The link I gave compared the number of people per million in Norway who make less than eleven dollars a day to the number of people in the US making less than eleven dollars a day.
I know you think socialism will solve all our problems, and it might would as long as we had some natural resource like oil, as Norway does, to sell to some rich country like America. But can't you find do a little better than those links, find something that defines the variables?
If indeed there are more people living in poverty in the US it is probably because our half assed socialist system, promoted by people like you, encourages them lay 'round the shack till the mail train comes back.
Posted by broonzy (anonymous) on September 26, 2008 at 11:13 p.m. (Suggest removal)
EnKiKur said :
"Pardon me, I meant to say that the poverty rate in Norway is about 24 times what it is in the US. Pardon me. Surprise again!"
He's got his numbers from... "coyote blog"... Who would trust a blogger like EnKiKur???
The statistics I trust are coming from :
LSU (http://text.lsuagcenter.com/NR/rdonlyres...)
or Economic Policy Institute of Washington(http://www.epi.org/books/swa2004/news/swafacts_international.pdf).
EnKiKur, you do not surprise anybody. Americans are smarter than you think... you should send your resume to Fox News, you might get a job (since you spend so much time gabbing on the Democrat blog...)
Posted by broonzy (anonymous) on September 26, 2008 at 11:20 p.m. (Suggest removal)
And EnKiKur is a fortune teller !!!
He said : "I know you think socialism will solve all our problems"
You're right.
My real name is Joseph Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili
Staline !!!
You're so clever !!!
I never said that socialism would solve all our problems. These are words you put in my mouth to create a fake debate, AGAIN !!!! You need to create questions and answers because you have nothing to say.
How can you contest stats from LSU and EPI ???
And if I would be a socialist I would move my #ss to North Korea. Buy a bus ticket and see the world. Maybe you will learn something...
Posted by broonzy (anonymous) on September 26, 2008 at 11:31 p.m. (Suggest removal)
And Look, dear EnKiKur-I-Know-It-All,
my dear fortune teller EnKiKur,
I'm not gonna come back on this page. I know you have nothing else to do but writing essays on the natchez dem. blog. And I'm sure your answer will be "surprising" as usual, and well fox-news informed. But I will not have time to read it tonight or tomorrow, cuz I'm working (my nickname is Aleksej Grigorevic Stakanov). The blog is all yours.
My dear gipsy-EnKiKur, you have the time to write your daily O'Reilly-style essay. The blog is all yours ! Predict our future, tell us who we are !!!!!!!
Posted by loneconservative (anonymous) on September 26, 2008 at 11:35 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Benjamin Disraeli once said, "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies and statistics."
Posted by Fenwick (anonymous) on September 26, 2008 at 11:45 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Gosh dang Miss broonzy, you must be very real smart cuz I don't understand nothing you are saying.
Posted by broonzy (anonymous) on September 26, 2008 at 11:49 p.m. (Suggest removal)
And Disraeli said too : "As a general rule the most succesful man in life is the man who has the best information"
You're more 'coyote blog' or LSU?
And I did not give statistics in my links. It was numbers from a census report.
Disraeli said something about 'census reports'???
Posted by broonzy (anonymous) on September 26, 2008 at 11:51 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Miss Fenwick, sorry, it's all about an old conversation... since I don't have that much time to spend on the log, I'm late in my answers. But check out those links I provided above. Hard facts.
Posted by EnKiKur (anonymous) on September 27, 2008 at 1:07 a.m. (Suggest removal)
I don't know if I trust those socialists down at LSU any more than I trust those over at EPI, whoever they are. LSU has long been a hotbed of socialist activity, ever since the days of Huey P.
I you will be kind enough to tell me which article that is you are so upset about I'll go look and see if that was really me or someone pretending to be me.
What makes your experts more expert than mine?
Posted by EnKiKur (anonymous) on September 27, 2008 at 1:27 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Okay, I see now, Your experts at the EPI are all academicians and labor unionists. No bias there in interpretation of statistics, I have to agree with you on that one.
The "Agenda for Shared Prosperity" doesn't sound like sharing wealth to me. Who would want to share wealth except those who don't have it? And because they don't have it, they should have a share of it exactly why?
Okay, your experts have convinced me, this is powerful stuff: http://www.sharedprosperity.org/av/towar...
I have to respect hard science like this. Getting the richest one percent of American wealth holders to share with the rest of us is a great plan! How are we going to do that though? Will we not grant them passports so they can't leave the country and do their evil elsewhere? And if we can keep them here, how are we going to make sure they keep working like they do now when we start making them share with us?
Expanding the middle class and making it more prosperous sounds great too. As soon as that happens I'm going to quit my job though because if it starts paying a middle class wage I want one that is easier and a hell of a lot less dangerous. I want one of those new green jobs where I get to where a green hard hat and walk around smiling!
Posted by EnKiKur (anonymous) on September 27, 2008 at 1:31 a.m. (Suggest removal)
The one advantage I will grant Norway over us is that they have a Constitutional Monarchy. Democracy is just too damn dangerous.
Posted by EnKiKur (anonymous) on September 27, 2008 at 2:12 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Why democracy isn't such a great idea:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=...
Posted by EnKiKur (anonymous) on September 27, 2008 at 4:08 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Thank you for converting me Broonzy. I need a little more help though. I am trying hard to understand poverty, so I went in search of OECD's definition of poverty. I found an eighty page paper full of stuff like this:
"How good are the data used in this report at measuring high incomes? The short answer is "probably not
very”, although this varies among countries. Quality of data on high incomes depends on how broad is the income
concept used, and on confidentiality norms applicable to persons with very high income. With regard to the first issue, the main feature is whether the income concept encompasses income sources that disproportionately accrue to the very rich. Capital gains are generally excluded from the income surveys of most OECD countries. Similarly, changes in the remuneration package of managers (e.g. the growing importance of stock options) have increased the importance of flows that are likely to be poorly or not recorded in household surveys. With regard to the second issue, the main feature is whether survey data “top code” income or earnings beyond a given threshold. Use of “top-coded” values will underestimate the extent of inequality at a point in time, while an increase in the share of the population that is “top coded” will dampen the recorded rise in income inequality."
And that is the easy stuff. Will you please help me understand? I am almost ready to vote for Obama, if you can tell me what all this means I am onboard!
http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/48/9/344836...
I'll even get a membership in the Democratic Socialists of America if you can tell me what the OECD definition of poverty is.
Posted by EnKiKur (anonymous) on September 27, 2008 at 4:20 a.m. (Suggest removal)
You do make a good point though, Norway has a population of 4.6 million and Louisiana a population of 4.2 million. We both have big oil fields. Norway nationalizes theirs while we do not. Norway has a GDP of 214 billion while Louisiana has a GDP of 123 billion. Those greedy oil people are making our kids poor. I could use a share of that oil money myself.
Too bad we joined up with that federal government, otherwise we could nationalize our oil fields.
Obama has my vote!
Posted by Yeahuhuh (anonymous) on September 27, 2008 at 7:18 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Let me see if I can outline something here.
Broonzy has been there, has extensive experience with children's plight and took issue with comparing Norway's poverty to Ferriday, Lake Povidence's poverty. Enkik supplied the link to discredit Broozy's claims using UN data.
Enkik's assessment did not address Norway's human values advantages that transfer enough to alter life and lifestyle, but compared the figure in his one original sample as his sole value judgment about the desirability of the systems. Enkik thereby eliminated the very reason socialism in Norway exists -- to make their life better on terms they are very familiar with -- hang the poverty figures.
Broonzy takes that as Enkik's achilles heel -- insisting we compare extreme ideological views of each system in order to obscure the real life factors of the systems, and make argument easier (to win). Look what Enkik wanted from the debates:
"I have an idea. Why don't we get two guys to pose as candidates of parties that are polar opposites and let the people choose one of them as leader every four years"
Enkik is brilliant. But we have a disease here in the US. We want to pretend the parties are polar opposites to make our thinking easier. They are not. Democrats are Republican Lite. Republicans WISH Democrats were extreme socialists, So they cast them as that. It is a political lie.
Democrats are Republican lite -- but they favor the individual who cannot be so mobile in culture. Republicans favor those who need no favor, and tell individuals who have less mobility they need that. As much as Democrats are socialists, Republicans are fascists -- bent on using social reasons and Big Government to imprison, alter behavior and conquer. The two parties are alike in more ways than they are different, but there are stylistic differences that cause big problems.
Ergo you see a debate of two men not too far apart, except that one is imperial in the way he addresses foreign policy and others (McCain) and the other is a bit kinder and stresses tactical differences more calmly. McCain NEEDS conflict to prevail and Obama needs someone who had rather discuss solutions instead of simply repeating Obama does not understand as if saying it makes it so.
The two mens' styles are a metaphor for how they would conduct foreign policy and the economic ripple effects. Unfortunatly for McCain that requires continued killing, reprisal terrorism, and stalemate in our international partners and resource plays. More of the same as we have had -- just so McCain can pretend being tuff and being an a** is really the skill we need to approach others. Some people like that so that is their world.
That's why most viewers think Obama won the debate. But those who find reason passe compared to conflict and domination were unmoved. No surprise.
Posted by time4change (anonymous) on September 27, 2008 at 8:35 a.m. (Suggest removal)
This is what I think after watching the debate; those planning to vote Republican, prior to the debate, will still vote Republican, those planning to vote Democrat, prior to the debate, will still vote Democrat, and those undecided are still undecided. I can't say that that has anything to do with either candidate. But, here is the thing, in reality John McCain's party expected him to win big over Obama in last nights debate because of his "supposed strength" in foreign policy, while as it turned out Obama held his own. So, as it seems, those of us who prefer diplomacy to dropping bombs on folks who irritate or scare us will prefer Obama and those who prefer dropping bombs rather than diplomacy will prefer John Wayne McCain.
I'm sure John McCain would love to be in control of spending at the White House, since he certainly isn't in control of spending at his own house. While $300,000 would get me, the average guy, completely out of debt with enough left over for retirement, the dress his wife purchased for the last night of the convention cost that, so you have to know that a small country could be fed on what she paid for the wardrobe to wear at the entire convention. And while he would love to make a salary which would bring him up to equal status with the wife's dividend checks, I'm pretty sure that he doesn't even know what all he owns, since most of it isn't in his name. While none of the above may make sense to you, I have a hard time believing that John McCain can relate to those among us who have had to struggle to pay the rent and utilities while figuring out how to put food on the table, must less be able to purchase the luxury of a healthcare policy and send their kids to college.
Posted by Yeahuhuh (anonymous) on September 27, 2008 at 10:48 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Nothing will help McCain fans see the situation. If 8 years of Bush hasn't shown them go figure -- they will never see.
The polls say undecided voters saw Obama winning the debate. That's what counts.
Posted by sammohon (anonymous) on September 28, 2008 at 11:25 p.m. (Suggest removal)
No one has pointed out that when comparing poverty levels, even when doing it on a comparative per annum basis, the standard of living in the US so far surpasses most other countries as to make the comparisons moot...even the poorest of the poor in the US are better off than most in the world...and all with as little socialism as we've been able to manage since we have to suffer Dems on occasion.
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