It truly is about the economy, stupid!

By Carol Gee

"McBush"

We all know the U.S. economy is in big trouble, requiring a massive bailout, according to Politico and many others. In years past the economy as an election issue has been owned by Democrats. But some people are asking whether Barack Obama can actually pull off winning the presidential election in November. Somehow I think so, more and more as time passes.

Many of us sensed yesterday that Senator McCain is also in big trouble, at times almost seeming to lose it. In recent days, Senator McCain was taken to task by MSNBC

for his failure to be "Mr. Straight Talk," Karl Rove himself has said the McCain went too far away from the truth in his campaign advertising. The truth is that, as Jared Bernstein says:

They're telling lies, and liars make fatal leaders. I don't just mean fatal in terms of fiscal recklessness and more economic failure. I mean fatal in terms of decisions that could cost people their lives.

Telling lies often goes hand in hand with covering up wrong-doing. It appears that, a la Karl Rove-style methods, the "Troopergate" investigation in Alaska will not go forward at this time, according to ProPublica. Democrats have not yet seized on the wrong-doing years ago of Governor Palin's running mate, Senator John McCain. The story is that John McCain Still Living The Keating Five Lush Highlife by bmaz (9/15/08) at Emptywheel. To quote:

. . . As a native Arizonan I have been witnessing what you are now realizing since John McCain plopped his carpet bag down and set up shop here in our state.

John Sidney McCain III would have you believe his Charlie Keating Five Scandal days of corruption and influence peddling are all a thing of his distant past and that he is some sort of legendary reformer now. Nothing could be further from the truth, he is still hard deeply entrenched in the lavish, exotic trappings of swag and influence peddled by the modern day equivalents of Charlie Keating.

In fact, new reporting by Ari Berman and Mark Ames of The Nation, in their article The McCain-Follieri Love Boat, which just hit the presses at the end of last week details how McCain has spent yet another birthday, his 70th, vacationing with a criminal con artist, Hollywood celebrities and big money lobbyists on a yacht in Montenegro. It shows what Arizonans have known all along: McCain is still the same old glad handing, do anything to serve his own raw ambition, politician who celebrated his birthdays with Charlie Keating and other power brokers at Keating's private Bahamas resort two decades ago.

Are Republicans at it again? Other elections in recent years have been marked by Republican wrong-doing. Now it seems that Republicans in Macomb County, Michigan are planning to block people from voting who use the addresses of their foreclosed homes. In the neighboring state of Wisconsin, a politically timed lawsuit by the state's Republican attorney general may be aimed at voter suppression. It may create chaos at polling places on Nov. 4.

People are asking whether Governor Sarah Palin is qualified to be the president. One of those most outspoken was Senator Chuck Hagel (R-Nebraska). We must remember with some concern that she is one heartbeat away from the presidency. McCain's surrogate Carly Fiorina said that Palin does not have enough experience to run a major corporation. Sarah Palin's links to the Christian Right cause people to worry that Christian fundamentalism permeates the Republican Party.

But I digress from my intended McCain focus. John Cusack, writing for The Huffington Post summarized the Democrats' quandary best in a great post warning Democrats against getting too distracted by Sarah Palin. To quote:

John McCain is the Republican Party as much as Bush -- we need to be constantly reminded of the policies (and, yes, the crimes) that are threatening this country from within.

Obama must hit Republicans ten times harder. Let's hear about war profiteering, taxpayer-funded mercenary armies and privatizing core functions of state, habeas corpus and warrantless wiretapping and presidential signing statements, and Katrina and justice department politicization, and phony intel and Abu Ghraib, rendition and torture.

Take heart Democrats. Listen to Cusack. It does not have to be more complicated than that.

References:

• Neilsen findings on party convention viewers --Nielsen has taken a closer look at the viewership to the two national political conventions to see if we could tease out any additional insights. The full analysis is available on the political section of the Nielsen blog.


• Campaign financing -- Both Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac gave big support to both senators Obama and McCain, according to ProPublica.

Hat Tip Key: Regular contributors of lead links are "betmo*" and Jon #.

(Cross-posted at South by Southwest.)