BREAKING NEWS: McCain SUSPENDS HIS CAMPAIGN (merged)

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Ah, the truth comes out. McCain is trying to get the Foreign Policy debate pushed back, and have that instead of the vice president debate, having no VP debate.
 
According to Drudge, 4 Republican members of the House support the Paulson plan.

Is McCain going to try to bridge the gap between the House GOP and Bush?
 
Real said:
According to Drudge, 4 Republican members of the House support the Paulson plan.

Is McCain going to try to bridge the gap between the House GOP and Bush?
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McCain is going to do whatever his team thinks will help him get elected. Obama, same thing.
 
Reid to McCain: Don't Come Back to Capitol

September 24, 2008 5:14 PM

A Democrat tells ABC News that, in a phone call late this afternoon, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., told Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., that it would NOT be helpful for him to come back to Washington, D.C., to work on the Wall Street bailout bill.

McCain this afternoon suspended his campaign and said he would skip the first presidential debate in order to return to Capitol Hill to work on the log-jammed Bush administration legislation, which, as of Wednesday afternoon, was in peril.

McCain had phoned Reid to ask about the prospects of him, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., and others to sit down and work together on hammering out a bipartisan proposal.

"Sorry," Reid said to him, a Democrat close to Reid says.

Reid then read McCain the statement he had just put out: "This is a critical time for our country," says the Reid statement. "While I appreciate that both candidates have signaled their willingness to help, Congress and the administration have a process in place to reach a solution to this unprecedented financial crisis. I understand that the candidates are putting together a joint statement at Sen. Obama’s suggestion. But it would not be helpful at this time to have them come back during these negotiations and risk injecting presidential politics into this process or distract important talks about the future of our nation’s economy. If that changes, we will call upon them. We need leadership; not a campaign photo op. If there were ever a time for both candidates to hold a debate before the American people about this serious challenge, it is now.”

A source close to Reid said McCain didn't have much to say after that. Reid, the source says, thinks McCain's maneuver is a gimmick born from bad poll numbers and the fact that "debate prep must not be going very well."

- jpt

UPDATE: McCain senior adviser Mark Salter emails: "Yesterday, Harry Reid said that consensus couldn't be achieved without John McCain's leadership. John stepped up and is providing that leadership. Now Senator Reid seems to have changed his mind for reasons we'll let him explain. But what he should understand is that this isn't about Harry Reid or John McCain or Barack Obama. It's about the American people and, in the words of Warren Buffet, the financial Pearl Harbor they're facing. John's committed to doing his part to help avert that calamity. We hope Senator Reid is too."

http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2008/09/reid-to-mccain.html
 
"But it would not be helpful at this time to have them come back during these negotiations and risk injecting presidential politics into this process or distract important talks about the future of our nation’s economy"




I think this is a good point
 
Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-New York, said McCain's move was "just weird."

"We haven't heard hide nor hair of Sen. McCain in these negotiations," said Schumer, chairman of the Senate Banking Committee. "He has not been involved except for an occasional, unhelpful statement, sort of thrown from far away, and the last thing we need in these delicate negotiations is an injection of presidential politics."


http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/09/24/campaign.wrap/index.html

to me what is weird is McCain's insistence that the candidates halt campaign ads. How in the world would that possibly help solve the banking crisis?
 
I'm shocked--shocked--to read that Harry Reid and Chuck Schumer are saying that John McCain coming back to DC isn't helpful. Stunning.
 
^ They're scared that he'll fix the problem and that their candidate will lose points in return.
 
Re: McCain wants to postpone Friday's debate

Dumpy said:
what choice do they have? You run for president, lose, and you lose your job as a result? That's crazy. I prefer the English system, where you vote for a party, and then the party installs its leader as PM.
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YES!

Let them lose their jobs for aspiring for the bigger one. Big fat egos. Power hungry bastards.
 
44Thrilla said:
I love how GOP supporters can't accept criticism of Palin's experience without trying to compare her to Obama, or Obama and McCain. The reason her experience is even brought up is because "experience" was McCain's main talking point up until he picked her. Remember the 947584505 "...but is he ready to lead?" ads?

We are allowed to criticize his choice because it was hypocritical. Obviously, as Obama supporters, we don't value "experience" as much as McCain wants us to, so telling us how inexperienced Obama is isn't going to make us care about what you say very much. And "experience" isn't the reason we don't like Palin, so trying to exaggerate her past experiences is also not going to get us to care, either.

Picking Palin was a political move made by McCain's campaign, it was the exact opposite of putting "country first". And if McCain really did believe that Palin was ready to step in, like he suggested, then he wouldn't be trying so hard to keep her away from the media.
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They have no case on this issue. Most Republicans I know understand that it was a gimmick anyway.

I question her title as "Governor", there are plenty of Mayors with more responsibilities than her. She's just a glorified small-town mayor as far as I'm concerned.
 
it's_GO_time said:
"But it would not be helpful at this time to have them come back during these negotiations and risk injecting presidential politics into this process or distract important talks about the future of our nation’s economy"




I think this is a good point
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Yes, let's not let one of the two men who will be responsible for this deal, whatever it ends up being, have input on the matter, especially when their current job calls for them to be there.

Wow
 
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Denny Crane said:
Oh, the irony! CountryWide is one of those companies supposedly on the bubble.

Seems like the money is there to be loaned.
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CountryWide has already failed. Buy something on that "loan". LOL
 
From 2003.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpa...sec=&spon=&partner=permalink&exprod=permalink

September 11, 2003
New Agency Proposed to Oversee Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae

By STEPHEN LABATON

The Bush administration today recommended the most significant regulatory overhaul in the housing finance industry since the savings and loan crisis a decade ago.

Under the plan, disclosed at a Congressional hearing today, a new agency would be created within the Treasury Department to assume supervision of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the government-sponsored companies that are the two largest players in the mortgage lending industry.

The new agency would have the authority, which now rests with Congress, to set one of the two capital-reserve requirements for the companies. It would exercise authority over any new lines of business. And it would determine whether the two are adequately managing the risks of their ballooning portfolios.

The plan is an acknowledgment by the administration that oversight of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac -- which together have issued more than $1.5 trillion in outstanding debt -- is broken. A report by outside investigators in July concluded that Freddie Mac manipulated its accounting to mislead investors, and critics have said Fannie Mae does not adequately hedge against rising interest rates.

''There is a general recognition that the supervisory system for housing-related government-sponsored enterprises neither has the tools, nor the stature, to deal effectively with the current size, complexity and importance of these enterprises,'' Treasury Secretary John W. Snow told the House Financial Services Committee in an appearance with Housing Secretary Mel Martinez, who also backed the plan.

Mr. Snow said that Congress should eliminate the power of the president to appoint directors to the companies, a sign that the administration is less concerned about the perks of patronage than it is about the potential political problems associated with any new difficulties arising at the companies.

The administration's proposal, which was endorsed in large part today by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, would not repeal the significant government subsidies granted to the two companies. And it does not alter the implicit guarantee that Washington will bail the companies out if they run into financial difficulty; that perception enables them to issue debt at significantly lower rates than their competitors. Nor would it remove the companies' exemptions from taxes and antifraud provisions of federal securities laws.

The proposal is the opening act in one of the biggest and most significant lobbying battles of the Congressional session.

After the hearing, Representative Michael G. Oxley, chairman of the Financial Services Committee, and Senator Richard Shelby, chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, announced their intention to draft legislation based on the administration's proposal. Industry executives said Congress could complete action on legislation before leaving for recess in the fall.

''The current regulator does not have the tools, or the mandate, to adequately regulate these enterprises,'' Mr. Oxley said at the hearing. ''We have seen in recent months that mismanagement and questionable accounting practices went largely unnoticed by the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight,'' the independent agency that now regulates the companies.

''These irregularities, which have been going on for several years, should have been detected earlier by the regulator,'' he added.

The Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight, which is part of the Department of Housing and Urban Development, was created by Congress in 1992 after the bailout of the savings and loan industry and concerns about regulation of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which buy mortgages from lenders and repackage them as securities or hold them in their own portfolios.

At the time, the companies and their allies beat back efforts for tougher oversight by the Treasury Department, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation or the Federal Reserve. Supporters of the companies said efforts to regulate the lenders tightly under those agencies might diminish their ability to finance loans for lower-income families. This year, however, the chances of passing legislation to tighten the oversight are better than in the past.

Reflecting the changing political climate, both Fannie Mae and its leading rivals applauded the administration's package. The support from Fannie Mae came after a round of discussions between it and the administration and assurances from the Treasury that it would not seek to change the company's mission.

After those assurances, Franklin D. Raines, Fannie Mae's chief executive, endorsed the shift of regulatory oversight to the Treasury Department, as well as other elements of the plan.

''We welcome the administration's approach outlined today,'' Mr. Raines said. The company opposes some smaller elements of the package, like one that eliminates the authority of the president to appoint 5 of the company's 18 board members.

Company executives said that the company preferred having the president select some directors. The company is also likely to lobby against the efforts that give regulators too much authority to approve its products.

Freddie Mac, whose accounting is under investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission and a United States attorney in Virginia, issued a statement calling the administration plan a ''responsible proposal.''

The stocks of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae fell while the prices of their bonds generally rose. Shares of Freddie Mac fell $2.04, or 3.7 percent, to $53.40, while Fannie Mae was down $1.62, or 2.4 percent, to $66.74. The price of a Fannie Mae bond due in March 2013 rose to 97.337 from 96.525.Its yield fell to 4.726 percent from 4.835 percent on Tuesday.

Fannie Mae, which was previously known as the Federal National Mortgage Association, and Freddie Mac, which was the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation, have been criticized by rivals for exerting too much influence over their regulators.

''The regulator has not only been outmanned, it has been outlobbied,'' said Representative Richard H. Baker, the Louisiana Republican who has proposed legislation similar to the administration proposal and who leads a subcommittee that oversees the companies. ''Being underfunded does not explain how a glowing report of Freddie's operations was released only hours before the managerial upheaval that followed. This is not world-class regulatory work.''

Significant details must still be worked out before Congress can approve a bill. Among the groups denouncing the proposal today were the National Association of Home Builders and Congressional Democrats who fear that tighter regulation of the companies could sharply reduce their commitment to financing low-income and affordable housing.

''These two entities -- Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac -- are not facing any kind of financial crisis,'' said Representative Barney Frank of Massachusetts, the ranking Democrat on the Financial Services Committee. ''The more people exaggerate these problems, the more pressure there is on these companies, the less we will see in terms of affordable housing.''

Representative Melvin L. Watt, Democrat of North Carolina, agreed.

''I don't see much other than a shell game going on here, moving something from one agency to another and in the process weakening the bargaining power of poorer families and their ability to get affordable housing,'' Mr. Watt said.


<!--#articleBody-->
 
John McCain, circa 2005, in the Senate.

I'll hold my breath waiting for the news to report this statement.

Mr. President, this week Fannie Mae’s regulator reported that the company’s quarterly reports of profit growth over the past few years were “illusions deliberately and systematically created” by the company’s senior management, which resulted in a $10.6 billion accounting scandal.

The Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight’s report goes on to say that Fannie Mae employees deliberately and intentionally manipulated financial reports to hit earnings targets in order to trigger bonuses for senior executives. In the case of Franklin Raines, Fannie Mae’s former chief executive officer, OFHEO’s report shows that over half of Mr. Raines’ compensation for the 6 years through 2003 was directly tied to meeting earnings targets. The report of financial misconduct at Fannie Mae echoes the deeply troubling $5 billion profit restatement at Freddie Mac.

The OFHEO report also states that Fannie Mae used its political power to lobby Congress in an effort to interfere with the regulator’s examination of the company’s accounting problems. This report comes some weeks after Freddie Mac paid a record $3.8 million fine in a settlement with the Federal Election Commission and restated lobbying disclosure reports from 2004 to 2005. These are entities that have demonstrated over and over again that they are deeply in need of reform.

For years I have been concerned about the regulatory structure that governs Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac–known as Government-sponsored entities or GSEs–and the sheer magnitude of these companies and the role they play in the housing market. OFHEO’s report this week does nothing to ease these concerns. In fact, the report does quite the contrary. OFHEO’s report solidifies my view that the GSEs need to be reformed without delay.

I join as a cosponsor of the Federal Housing Enterprise Regulatory Reform Act of 2005, S. 190, to underscore my support for quick passage of GSE regulatory reform legislation. 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.
I urge my colleagues to support swift action on this GSE reform legislation.
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http://www.govtrack.us/congress/rec...x002Fmcrmx002Fms20060525-16.xmlElementm0m0m0m

Meanwhile, Obama has taken the second most money of anyone from Fannie/Freddie, and he's only been in office for less than 4 years! So that means he has taken more money than any politician from Fannie/Freddie since he's been in Congress.
 
Denny Crane said:
Reading this, it's clear McCain doesn't have a clue. What may be true is that he can't get stuff done.

http://hotair.com/archives/2008/09/17/mccains-attempt-to-fix-fannie-mae-freddie-mac-in-2005/
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Please elaborate on him nailing Fannie/Freddie as early as 2005 is him "not having a clue".

Here is a guy who didn't have a clue, FWIW.

I want to begin by saying that I am glad to consider the legislation, but I do not think we are facing any kind of a crisis. That is, in my view, the two government sponsored enterprises we are talking about here, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, are not in a crisis. We have recently had an accounting problem with Freddie Mac that has led to people being dismissed, as appears to be appropriate. I do not think at this point there is a problem with a threat to the Treasury.

I must say we have an interesting example of self-fulfilling prophecy. Some of the critics of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac say that the problem is that the Federal Government is obligated to bail out people who might lose money in connection with them. I do not believe that we have any such obligation. And as I said, it is a self-fulfilling prophecy by some people.

So let me make it clear, I am a strong supporter of the role that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac play in housing, but nobody who invests in them should come looking to me for a nickel--nor anybody else in the Federal Government. And if investors take some comfort and want to lend them a little money and less interest rates, because they like this set of affiliations, good, because housing will benefit. But there is no guarantee, there is no explicit guarantee, there is no implicit guarantee, there is no wink-and-nod guarantee. Invest, and you are on your own.

Now, we have got a system that I think has worked very well to help housing. The high cost of housing is one of the great social bombs of this country. I would rank it second to the inadequacy of our health delivery system as a problem that afflicts many, many Americans. We have gotten recent reports about the difficulty here.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have played a very useful role in helping make housing more affordable, both in general through leveraging the mortgage market, and in particular, they have a mission that this Congress has given them in return for some of the arrangements which are of some benefit to them to focus on affordable housing, and that is what I am concerned about here. I believe that we, as the Federal Government, have probably done too little rather than too much to push them to meet the goals of affordable housing and to set reasonable goals. I worry frankly that there is a tension here.

The more people, in my judgment, exaggerate a threat of safety and soundness, the more people conjure up the possibility of serious financial losses to the Treasury, which I do not see. I think we see entities that are fundamentally sound financially and withstand some of the disastrous scenarios. And even if there were a problem, the Federal Government doesn't bail them out. But the more pressure there is there, then the less I think we see in terms of affordable housing.
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This is Barney Frank in 2003, who had the alleged job of overseeing Fannie/Freddie. Un-fucking-real. Where is the media!!!!!!

http://www.taxfoundation.org/blog/show/23617.html
 
I have no idea why McCain's recent ads aren't him holding up the NY Times and reading this article from it.

"I couldn't get it done as 1 of 100 senators. Give me the power as president, with veto power and all that, and I CAN get things done."
 
Denny Crane said:
^^^ sarcasm, my friend.
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Aha. Anyhow, I just had dinner with my wife, kids, and some friends. They were a bit freaked out by this, as people should be.

Now Obama has decided to go to DC tomorrow, but only after Daddy W asked him to come. Unreal.
 
PapaG said:
Aha. Anyhow, I just had dinner with my wife, kids, and some friends. They were a bit freaked out by this, as people should be.

Now Obama has decided to go to DC tomorrow, but only after Daddy W asked him to come. Unreal.
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Obama's scared to debate McCain and loves the chance at the out. Probably doesn't want to see Biden have to debate Palin and lose, either.
 
Denny Crane said:
I have no idea why McCain's recent ads aren't him holding up the NY Times and reading this article from it.
"I couldn't get it done as 1 of 100 senators. Give me the power as president, with veto power and all that, and I CAN get things done."
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Brilliant.
 
Denny Crane said:
How about a C-SPAN clip of him making that speech in 2005?
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That's great too. The problem for me is I'm more to the Lieberman side of moderate, at least socially, than is even McCain.

McCain won me over be his steadfast belief in winning the war in Iraq. And judging by the silence from Obama and the Obamedia, that war must be pretty close to being successful, at least in terms of stability for Iraq.
 
Don't piss off Letterman.

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He'll bring on bathtub boy and make fun of you.
 
PapaG said:
That's great too. The problem for me is I'm more to the Lieberman side of moderate, at least socially, than is even McCain.

McCain won me over be his steadfast belief in winning the war in Iraq. And judging by the silence from Obama and the Obamedia, that war must be pretty close to being successful, at least in terms of stability for Iraq.
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I made a post somewhere in this forum about my positions.

EXTREMELY Liberal - not in the "progressive" sense of the word.

Pro choice, pro gay marriage, pro gun/2nd amendment, pro union, pro civil rights, etc.

Like you, I see no possible benefit of tucking tail and running away from our obligations to the people of Iraq like has been done so many times before in so many places. Though I thought in 2004 we should have brought the troops home and sent the Iraqis lots of money to rebuild on their own. They could have sorted it out without our help, IMO. Once the decision was made to occupy and rebuild (a good case could be made for it as well), it's a 10 year mission. Patience.
 
mccain is a fucking poser.


and obama isn't?


got me on that one.


who to vote for? Sure, I'd rather have Ron Paul.... but to vote for him doesn't do anything, or does a vote for anyone else. I feel like I gotta pick between two candidates that don't inspire me.


What will your choice be?
 
ucatchtrout said:
mccain is a fucking poser.


and obama isn't?


got me on that one.


who to vote for? Sure, I'd rather have Ron Paul.... but to vote for him doesn't do anything, or does a vote for anyone else. I feel like I gotta pick between two candidates that don't inspire me.


What will your choice be?
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With a gun to my head and pick between the two, Obama.

I don't see how the guy you actually want to win can win if you won't vote for him.
:dunno:
 
Denny Crane said:
I made a post somewhere in this forum about my positions.

EXTREMELY Liberal - not in the "progressive" sense of the word.

Pro choice, pro gay marriage, pro gun/2nd amendment, pro union, pro civil rights, etc.

Like you, I see no possible benefit of tucking tail and running away from our obligations to the people of Iraq like has been done so many times before in so many places. Though I thought in 2004 we should have brought the troops home and sent the Iraqis lots of money to rebuild on their own. They could have sorted it out without our help, IMO. Once the decision was made to occupy and rebuild (a good case could be made for it as well), it's a 10 year mission. Patience.
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so, either you are adept at playing devil's advocate, or do you really think that a McCain presidency wouldn't hinder these social policies?

how about energy policy?
 
Dumpy said:
so, either you are adept at playing devil's advocate, or do you really think that a McCain presidency wouldn't hinder these social policies?

how about energy policy?
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Yeah, let's not use our greatest natural resource and make money off of it. Notice Obama doesn't talk about global warming anymore?
 
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