McCain is definitely no eonomist. But I don't feel much better about the other guys whose chief economic advisors were former bigwigs of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.....

The oft-repeated recent quote from McCain on the economy:

'The economy is still stong.'

The actual quote in context:

"The fundamentals of our economy are strong, but these are very, very difficult times.”

I see a wee bit of difference there....

Clueless?
How's that?
Both McCain and Obama get the same daily dose of financial reports that the whole country gets.
NO one breathing is clueless that the economy is struggling.
Certainly not any presidential candidate with a huge staff of experts.

Suggesting one candidate is clueless is simple politics.

Ben, great point. Remember, the linked article to "clueless" is from the NY Times. Their agenda is always very clearly slanted to the extreme left, just like unfair articles that come from the extreme right wing fringe. Just consider the source. McCain may not who some want for President and that's fine, but he is far from clueless.

Well, Ben, as Dorothy Parker said (when asked to use the word horticulture in a sentence,) "You can bring a horticulture, but you can't make her think."

You can get all the reports in the world given to you, but if you don't read them, or don't have the intellecutual enzymes needed to break them down and digest them, you'll end up thinking some crap like, "the fundamentals of the economy are strong."

ejs,
I see you are adopting the left's usual approach. From that one quote you are able to read McCain's mind.
Quite a talent.

McCain "doesn't read any economic news reports?"
And even if he did he wouldn't know how to "break them down and digest them?"

What is it that triggers that sort of presumption from you?

You must have been doing a lot of digeting.

Thank heavens for Dorothy Parker. My question for you guys is when do I jump off the building? Not that my investments were anything but paper in the first place but I am scared. Left or right, we will all be standing in the same bread line.

If this deprecation is as good as the progressives can do, Obama is in big trouble.

McCain is worse than clueless. He's latched onto Phil Gramm - the person second only to Alan Greenspan as being the idiot most responsible for this crisis. That's according to Paul Krugman and others.

Plus, Phil Gramm is supposedly in line for Sec. of the Treasury if McCain gets elected.
He only left the campaign after he called us a nation of whiners and assured us this was just a mental recession in our heads.
Of course, if we give into the fear, and there's a bank run across the board, this will be bad so it is partly in our heads. By the way, these are the times when a government's credibility is worth so much. Unfortunately, anytime a Bush spokesman speaks, many of us find it hard to believe, based on their long record of lying in office starting with Bush's oath to protect the Constitution on Day 1, and descending into lying us into a war in Iraq. And wouldn't that money be helpful about now.
Phil Gramm. If you want a culprit with the ability to bring on a Great Depression in a McCain administration - he's just the guy you've been looking for.

Jack, you really should stick to local stuff. Joining the national crowd didn't get you the props you've earned.

Please only loathe the same people I loathe. On others, please should remain silent.

/sarcasm

How about we start with McCain's admission that economics isn't his strong point? And then we can move on to his "the fundamentals of the economy are strong."

Of course, we can infer from his statement that by "fundamentally strong" he really meant the workers of America were still the most productive in the world, that he either has become a Marxist who believes workers are the essence of any economy, (this despite continually voting against minimum wage increases) and/or that he feels the Great Depression was caused by lazy or unproductive workers rather than by forces beyond the worker's ability to control.

I think McCain is an economic moron because everything he has said about economics up to now in his campaign has been moronic. Just like I thought every thing Bush 43 said about anything was idiotic. But please, diabuse me, by coherently articulating the insights and strengths McCain brings to the debate on economics. For me it sounds like, "Let them eat cliches." I know, I know, we have to get rid of the death tax because we don't want dead people to be dirt poor.

Seriously, enlighten me to the strenghts of McCain's economic policy, point out to me how they drastically differ from the bank failure policies of the present administration, or go read a book, absorb some enzymes if you will, instead of wasting everybody's time posting the usual suspect, right not wrought, arguments.

Why all the preoccupation with the "Truth" and whether or not the candidates are telling it?

It doesn't matter what McCain or Palin said or didn't say...it doesn't matter what the "Truth" is.

Portland is a liberal bubble and has a myopic view of the US and it's inhabitants. Meaning we assume the rest of the country is populated with "reasonable" people who make decisions based on "Truth"

Most people in this country could care less about the "truth". They're i-g-n-o-r-a-n-t. They like clever one-liners and mean-spirited rhetoric with a helping of macho patriotic bs. The Republicans give them what they want, Democrats don't.

People could be living in tents in their own refuse and would still elect McCain/Palin by a landslide.

BTW, I did not grow up here...I grew in Central Illinois in a town of 20,000...raised by poor dirt farmers. I know the mindset...I lived it.

Oh yes I did say "McCain and Palin will win by a landslide"...

Wow Bill ... if Paul Krugman says it's so, we ought to just buy right into that! What makes Mr. Krugman any different than any other pundit and what do we care what he thinks? Greenspan the "idiot," let's not forget, was in charge during the booming '90s and the early years of this administration, but also warned BOTH times of the dangers that would result from the consumers' overexuberance (the dot com bust and the credit crunch).

You have to love Republicans: The only time they're skeptical about what their candidates say is when the candidate says he doesn't know much about economics.

I must be getting cynical. When I wrote that comment I said to myself, "I bet whomever responds will challenge Krugman, and then switch to other topics without mentioning Phill Gramm - the point of the comment - at all."

Deep down inside McCain is a warrior and he is preoccupied by war and preserving his notion of American "honor" by not "losing" the war in Iraq. As stated in his own words, he will pretty much turn all of the economic issues over to a commission where they will chew the fat and do nothing while we sink further and further into recession/depression. So if you want more war and a crappy economy vote McCain-Palin!

Here's how the losses got so big:
"Credit default swaps are essentially insurance policies covering the losses on securities in the event of a default. Financial institutions buy them to protect themselves if an investment they hold goes south. It's like bookies trading bets, with banks and hedge funds gambling on whether an investment (say, a pile of subprime mortgages bundled into a security) will succeed or fail. Because of the swap-related provisions of Gramm's bill—which were supported by Fed chairman Alan Greenspan and Treasury secretary Larry Summers—a $62 trillion market (nearly four times the size of the entire US stock market) remained utterly unregulated, meaning no one made sure the banks and hedge funds had the assets to cover the losses they guaranteed."

Gramm matters more than Greenspan now because Greenspan is not McCain's former advisor and potential cabinet member.

Comrades, all hail the Union of Socialist Republicans!

Hm, botched the HTML, here's the link:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/9/17/74214/0916/698/601376

Clueless on the economy? Sen. Harry Reid today via ABC News:

"Z. Byron Wolf reports from Capitol Hill:
Don't look for any legislation in the near future to address the financial crisis.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, asked today what actions Congress can take, said, bluntly, "No one knows what to do. We are in new territory here. This is a different game. We're not here playing soccer, basketball or football, this is a new game and we're going to have to figure out how to do it."

No Roger, precisely the opposite. The only time they are skeptical is when their candidates start acting like "intellectuals" because that means the candidate thinks they are "better than them" and hence not one of them.

The question to each candidate is "do you want to be right or do you want to win?"

Republicans want to win and win they will.

Disclaimer: I am NOT a republican and I am voting for Obama *despite* my lack of faith in my fellow Americans.

There's Butch with his or her pet move, "Look over here. Don't look at the problem my people caused. Don't look at Phil Gramm and how much he had to do with this. And please don't look at how much influence he has on McCain. Look at something else. Isn't Sarah Palin hot?"

Corporate socialism. And the deregulation mantra we've heard (the government hands-off stuff) sure doesn't apply when the Big Boys take a fall.
Then it's all about the welfare state.
I'm sure most Americans are in favor of getting government off our backs with deregulation. That's what they've been sold.
But lack of government oversight is why kids' toys had lead problems, too. These Wall Street games are just bigger toys for Bigger Boys, and they don't want any supervision unless they stub their toe. Then it's "Mommy, help!" as they run to the federal government. Priceless.
It's corporate family values.

Well, Bill, you got the 'isn't Sarah Palin hot' part right anyway.

And obviously the lack of government oversight. You just can't seem to grasp that we've have a TWO party system for the several decades. And no, the two parties are not the Republicans and the GOP.

Sigh.

It's always someone else's fault.

Yeah, I'm upset that the financial markets are in a shambles, and more is yet to come.

When everything hits the fan, it's the President's fault. Of Course Congress or the opposing party, has no finger in the soup when things go wrong. I forgot, what is the job of our Senators and Representatives?

Whoever is in charge next, I hope he (she?) is more successful in getting everyone to play nicely together. The current bunch surely has not been able to do anything for the good of the country.

The candidates currently in the running have shown no ability to work towards any solutions - their talk is cheap and filled with empty promises.

Whoever wins in November, will have about 100 days to set an agenda, and start turning this country around. After that, the focus will shift quickly to getting re-elected.

All we've seen so far is how easily everyone's attention can be diverted by trivial matters. The blame game is fun to play, but has no winners. The harder game to play is understanding the issues and evaluating the best courses of action.

Personalities only win elections; they never solve problems.

Rep. Peter DeFazio today told LIARS listeners that the US Govt bought AIG.

That's us. We're the new owners. We can send some of our accounting folks to audit the books of our new property.

Soon we, the people, can see what's reported from following the money ... and at the end of each trail finding a person of interest ... perhaps to fill a cell in one of the prisons we, the people, own.

In earlier times, massmedia reporters did the auditing and reporting. But, hey, nevermind, massmedia guys and gals, don't bother your profit margin with hiring actual working reporters. Public auditors can take it from here.

Indeed, you massmedia folks take a seat right there where we can see you. You're next. We, the people, buy bankruptcies. Have your bookkeeping ready and available.

Call it 'socialism' or whatever you'd like to call it. Just saying, the point is, you massmedia folks don't get to report, or call it anything, anymore.

Let us see the account balances and assets appraisal, please. We can do this two ways: 'Please,' is one; or would you rather do it the other way ...

"... the intellecutual enzymes needed to break ... down and digest (information)."

That, is the funniest line I have heard in a blue moon while. I am soooo going to steal it.

"... how easily everyone's attention can be diverted by trivial matters."

NOT everyone. Only every bobbing-head one in the echo-chamber bubble of the rightwing minority splinter-few fuming "the fundamentals are fine." Inside the bubble, 'fundamentals' don't include mentals.

Outside the bubble, NOone's attention is diverted.

Thank You, Sherrod Brown: Senate Democrat Puts Keating Scandal on the Table against McCain, Diary by Mark C. Eades, September 17, 2008

... McCain's biggest scandal to date: his role in the Keating savings and loan scandal of the 1980s.

McCain and four other Senators - known collectively as the "Keating Five" - were accused in 1989 of improperly aiding Arizona banker Charles Keating in efforts to hamper regulatory intrusions on the industry's risky investment practices. McCain, who had received over $100,000 in campaign contributions from Keating, was officially rebuked ....

Yesterday, however, Democratic silence on the Keating scandal was broken by Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio:

"It is not so much [McCain's] economic proposals but his economic record.... His main adviser is Phil Gramm -- he was his mentor in the Senate -- and you just tie it all together. ... John McCain ..., from the Keating Five on, his ethics have been questionable."

The US Senate seems to be 'drilling down,' drilling McCain, drilling now. In similar fashion, outside of Oregon the story played widely, and still is, reporting Sen.Smith hires undocumented workers to cheat, for Smith's richer pea profit packing margin. That is diversion, all right ... money diversion, not attention diverting.

Sep 17, 2008 -ABC reported McCain's comment that "economy is broken," but not previous day's comment that "fundamentals of our economy are strong"

Summary: ABC's David Wright aired a quote of Sen. John McCain saying during a September 16 speech that "[o]ur economy is broken." But Wright did not note that the previous day -- and many times before that -- McCain made a remark that was flatly inconsistent with that comment, saying that "the fundamentals of our economy are strong."

McCain and Palin are laughing at the press -- and it's the press' fault, by Eric Boehlert, Sep 16, 2008.

TV celebrity joke: 'Did I tell you today I love me?'

It's difficult to post after Tensky. He's like the author of the text on the bottles of Dr. Bronner's soap. I'm not sure what the heck it all means but I know it's good and pure and 100 % cruelty free.

You left out that McCain later tried to say that by fundamentals he meant
the American worker, showing that his BS fundamentals are still going strong.

Meanwhile, away from Wallstreet where Bill will soon be hunting moose:

"The second-quarter growth rate for the U.S. economy was revised upward, to 3.3 percent."

McCain very well may be clueless on the economy, but he nailed this one in May of 2006:
"For years I have been concerned about the regulatory structure that governs Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac....

If Congress does not act, American taxpayers will continue to be exposed to the enormous risk that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac pose to the housing market, the overall financial system, and the economy as a whole."

Read the whole thing at http://www.govtrack.us/congress/record.xpd?id=109-s20060525-16&bill=s109-190#sMonofilemx003Ammx002Fmmx002Fmmx002Fmhomemx002Fmgovtrackmx002Fmdatamx002Fmusmx002Fm109mx002Fmcrmx002Fms20060525-16.xmlElementm0m0m0m

McPain is blotto. Faggedabouddit.

Meanwhile, here's an early bellweather sketch of the 'deep background.' Get down with it.

Global Financial Meltdown, by Michel Chossudovsky, Global Research, September 18, 2008.

The Most Serious Financial Crisis since the 1929 Wall Street Crash

When viewed in a global context, taking into account the instability generated by speculative trade, the implications of this crisis are far-reaching.

The crisis, however, has by no means reached its climax. It could potentially disrupt the very foundations of the international monetary system. The repercussions on people's lives in America and around the world are dramatic.

The crisis is not limited to the meltdown of financial markets. The real economy at the national and international levels, its institutions, its productive structures are also in jeopardy.

As stock values collapse, lifelong household savings are eroded, not to mention pension funds. ...