Johnny Coli

Or maybe they think it's better for the country, the stability of the market and the confidence of investors if they all get behind a bipartisan solution.

I've responded twice, and freaking John Adams himself has responded. How many of us do you have on ignore?

So, you'd rather they just ram it through without GOP participation? Sorry, I'm trying to see how asking the GOP members of Congress to help pass a bipartisan piece of legislation regarding a crisis of this magnitude is making the Dems look bad.

So, what you're Rush is saying is that it's a bad thing that the Dems want to get the GOP members of Congress on board with a plan that will have a significant impact on the US and the Global economy. A bipartisan solution is now a thing to be scorned? That's an interesting take.

Anybody still think this guy has a shred of credibility or dignity left in his body?

Good one.

The deal was done. All parties were essentially on board until his stunt. If you are going to inject yourself into something of this magnitude and call for a meeting to take place, then you better well have an idea or a solution to propose if the negotiations start to sour. He flew in for a photo op, convinced the radicals of his party in the House to raise a stink, then sat idlly by while it went up in flames. Is that the kind of guy you want sitting in on diplomatic negotiations? Is that the guy you want making foreign policy?

Nope. Passion for the country I love and the direction I want it to go in. I believe Obama is the candidate that comes closest to my positions on a majority of the issues. I don't believe McCain is going to be good for this country, or the world for that matter, and I don't want a person with the views Palin has anywhere near the White House. I'm not drinking any Koolaid. I am probably one of the most informed voters that frequents this message board. You don't like my politics, nor the views I have, nor do we share the same ideas as to what direction we'd like to see this country take a step in. But accusing me of being a lemming couldn't be further from the truth.

What a joke. Is there any doubt what his real agenda is now? Does anyone still believe his nonsense about "suspending" his campaign (which still plods along...yet one more lie from the maverick)? McCain Leaps Into a Thicket Blow into town and help tank a bipartisan solution. Call a meeting that you don't participate in. Present no ideas. Play no role in solving the crisis YOU are personally prolonging. Just so you can get out of a debate.

And here we go. To criticize Palin is to be sexist, right? I'm not the one keeping her from speaking to the press and doing interviews. And if Jindal sounded as completely in over his head as Palin does, you can bet I'd be hammering away at his responses, too. She didn't answer any of the questions in any way that would show she had a grasp of what she was spitting out of her mouth. That has nothing to do with her gender. As for her record as a governor, the more you examine it the less likely you are of wanting her to run anything in an executive capacity.

He only showed up to inject himself into the crisis and cajole the GOP House caucus to tank the negotiations. What a great leader. What a man of conviction.

I'm not confused at all. She's done three soft interviews and has looked stupid in all three. You've added a comma into the transcript. Why? That wasn't how she framed that sentence when she spoke it. It was a moric run-on blurt of talking points that had nothing to do with the question that was asked. Not only didn't she answer the question, she couldn't form a coherent thought. Editing the transcript to try and prove your "point" is pathetic...and pretty partisan for a poster who's trying to look like he's above it all.

Of course it's partisan. But just because I am vehemently opposed to everything her and her party stand for, it doesn't detract from that fact that her answer was rubbish.

No, I expect a thoughtful response to a relevant question asked of a VP candidate. Whether I agree with them or not, I would expect they have an ounce of intelligence, or at least some grasp of the current events. The economy and bailout has been front-and-center for two weeks. You could pull a high school kid off the street and get a more coherent answer.

I watched the video (horrifying). The transcript doesn't do it justice. She stammers through an "answer" by blurting out everything her handlers drilled into her skull. She never answers Couric's actual question, and yes, JK200 is spot on. She rambles on about tax reductions twice in the same stream-of-consciousness regurgitation. Let's look at her answer. Doesn't answer Couric's question, and has zero substance. Plus, she's just repeating the question back at Couric, which reveals she has no idea what she's talking about. A light must have clicked on...must remember to mention creating jobs. Still doesn't answer Couric's question. Terrible grammar aside, it has nothing to do with the question asked, nor does it relate to any of the other rubbish she spat out prior to it. If this was an answer to a written exam she'd get a big zero. It's throwing crap at a wall.

Except that's not what she said. She was stammering out talking points faster than her brain could keep up, and ended up sounding like an idiot. She had to cram for a Katie Couric interview. I used to see these kind of answers in essay booklets all the time when I was teaching. Student crams for exam, has no idea what the answer is, so they write down everything they can remember hoping to get a few points out of a total bull sh-- answer. Taxes, reduce spending, taxes, healthcare. It's pathetic. She can't even handle Katie Couric's softballs.

bull sh--. Obama has at the very least read Bush's plan, and you can bet he's more on top of what Congress is negotiating than McCain. McCain has already admitted he didn't read the Bush plan. If he's not going to take the time to read a three page document, then you can be sure he's not interested in being briefed on the Congressional plan, especially if he's only breezing into town for a photo op and to spoon Lieberman. At this point he's going to try and monkeywrench any plan, as having no legislation gets him out of the debate and looking even more clueless and out of it than he already does.

Does anyone really believe McCain's even read any incarnation of either Bush's three-page money-grab or the bipartisan solution just worked out? There's one thing McCain is watching, and that's the insta-polls that will pop up once the details of the Congess plan are unveiled. If a majority of Americans don't think it's a good deal, then McCain will deem it bad and you'll see a press conference with him saying he won't support it. He won't give any specifcs as to what he doesn't like about it (because it would be painfully obvious he had never read it), and I can guarantee he won't answer any questions. He'll trot out his bogus line about how he's the only one standing up for the working man, how he's the maverick voting against the grain. He'll storm into the session just to vote "nay," then disappear as quickly as the last camera flash fades. Another shameless political stunt.

Looks like he didn't suspend anything. His surrogates are all over the TV. His VP pick is campaigning at Ground Zero. One more lie to add to the list. What a clown.

What? The media doesn't feel threatened by Palin. The media was thrilled with the pick. It was spectacular political theater. But the pick was made over a month ago, the applause has died down, and the McCain campaign has sequestered her from anything other than photo ops. The three interviews she has been allowed to do, Gibson, Hannity, and Couric, she looked totally outclassed. Now they want to push back her debate? The problem is the McCain campaign never really vetted this woman, and it was left to the press to find out what they could on her. If she's not going to be allowed to answer any off-the-cuff, unstaged questions, then the press and the American people going to start asking why. And good for them. McCain hasn't delivered a single coherent reason for picking this woman, and just about every proclamation they make on her behalf is quickly shot down with a single Google search. Furthermore, she's brought nothing to his campaign. His polling numbers are no better than before the conventions. She's actually costing him votes in the white female demographic. Independents haven't been swayed. She didn't get the Clinton supporters. Her Couric interview was a disaster. No, I'd say the press isn't threatened by Palin. The idea of her getting anywhere near the White House is scary as hell, but in that light the press is in good company, as the majority of Americans have a pretty low opinion of her. Ask yourself why the McCain campaign has kept her under wraps. Ask yourself why the McCain campaign is trying like hell to keep her out of the debates. Ask yourself why the McCain campaign won't let her near the press without a gag on. No. The press isn't threatened by her. McCain is scared of what she'll say if she's allowed to open her mouth.

Multiple reasons, but none that are related to the economy crisis: - He's getting killed in the polls, particularly wrt the economy and is trying (and failing) to change the conventional wisdom that he has no idea what he's doing - "Suspending" the campaign and not preparing for the debate further lowers expectations if the debate goes forward..."I'm not prepared because I was attending to a crisis." - He's totally unprepared to debate Obama, and would rather take the political risk of looking like he's avoiding the debates than get killed in the debates - His unvetted VP pick has been cramming for two weeks and the campaign has decided, like they have with respect to her fielding any unscripted questions from the media, that it would kill them to have her debate anyone on a national stage His campaign has calculated that the negatives associated with both him and his unvetted VP pick never debating are far less damaging than the negatives they would get hit with if they actually debate. That's what this is about.

Actually, the story broke in the NYT, Newsweek and Roll Call. McCain is trying to brush it off as a liberal media hit piece by only attacking the NYT, which it is clearly not. And, Newsweek has followed up their piece showing that Davis hasn't "severed his relationship with Davis Manafort in 2006," and has been listed as a crporate officer (Treasurer and one of two coporate directors) as recently as April of this year. That's not severing ties. The article brings up an important question--if the only person (Davis) who was working on the Freddie Mac account was no longer working on the Freddie Mac account and had suspended his day-to-day workings in the firm (although still remaining a corporate officer ), then why was Davis Manafort continuing to bill Freddie Mac if Davis wasn't doing anything for them.

Lost in the commotion of McCain pulling a fire alarm to get out of an exam is that he was also calling for a suspension of all campaigning. Not only did he not want to debate, he was basically calling "uncle" to try and stop the beat down he was getting for the past ten days. Pathetic. Looks like he wants to postpone the debate until next Thurday...the day the VP debate was supposed to be held, which will get re-scheduled, too. Now it's all starting to make sense.

Yeah, no way a guy whose name is first on the letterhead of a lobbying firm getting 15k a month for years from Freddie Mac got anying out of that arrangement. Was Davis the one cashing the checks? Doubtful. But he, sorry his firm , was kept on the Freddie Mac payroll because of his ties to McCain. That's right there in the NYT article and in the Newsweek article. So, Freddie Mac is giving his firm 15k a month because he's McCain's campaign manager, and no one else at his firm was handling the account. The question shouldn't be "was Davis pocketing the retainer personally," it should be what the !@#$ Freddie Mac hoped to get out of the deal for $2 million dollars and unfettered access to McCain. Keep arguing about who signed the checks, though.

The first debate was supposed to be about the economy, but the Obama campaign lobbied to have the first debate changed to foreign policy. So, one of these candidates chose to meet his perceived weak point head on, the other is reducing the presidential vetting process to gimmicks. I actually like that Biden is vocal. The people who have a problem with Biden are in a shrinking minority. That's in stark contrast to the "other VP pick" whose numbers are dropping almost as fast as the Dow.