John McCain has announced that he is suspending his campaign in order to return to Washington to help pass legislation on the financial bailout. He is characterizing this political stunt as a way of avoiding political stunts. In fact, Barack Obama’s team reportedly called McCain’s camp this morning to discuss issuing a joint statement, to which McCain agreed. But McCain then stole the ball and ran down field with it in an attempt to score all of the points for himself. So McCain wants to get away from partisanship by reneging on his agreement with Obama and returning to Washington, DC, where there is never any partisanship?
In addition to the suspension of campaign activity (which subsequent reporting suggests may just be dropping TV ads), McCain is proposing that the debate scheduled for Friday be postponed. He argues that the economy is too important not to take this step. McCain is right that the financial problems we are facing are important, but so is electing the next president. I don’t see how participating in the debate would throw the economy into a tailspin. And if you can’t participate in congressional actions in the daytime and show up for a debate in the evening, then you aren’t fit to president – a job that requires multitasking. The presence of the candidates in DC can be useful to focus attention, but they are not critical to the sausage-making process. They should lead by articulating direction and vision. What better place to do that than a nationally televised debate?
At this point, it appears that Obama wants the debates to proceed: Obama Camp: ‘The Debate is On’ That is exactly the right response. Let’s hope it sticks.
Update: Obama made a statement on the financial crisis and presented a timeline that shows that he was indeed the one who initiated the discussion. He thought that McCain was considering the things they discussed, but instead McCain went on TV with his statement, betraying the notion of bipartisanship.
With regard to the debates, Obama confirms that he thinks it is more important than ever to present themselves to the American people. He said that they ought to be able to deal with more than one thing at a time.
I think it is also significant that after McCain made his statement, he scurried hurriedly out of the room. Obama stayed and took questions from the press, as a responsible leader would do.
Update II: The McCain campaign is now proposing that the first presidential debate occur on October 2, the date presently set for the vice presidential debate. The VP debate would then occur on a later, undetermined date.
If McCain really wants to move the presidential debate to Oct 2, why doesn’t he just suggest swapping the events and have the VP debate this Friday? Surely the economic bill can be written without Palin and Biden. The preparations, the venue, the personnel, and the media are already in place. And there is precious little time to reschedule the VP affair before the election on November 4. This seems to be a wholly transparent attempt to further avoid exposing Sarah Palin to any public scrutiny. She must really be failing miserably in her practice sessions.
Update III: McCain retreats! The debate is on. So I guess the financial crisis has been resolved (not). His statement contained these contradictions:
“There was no deal or offer yesterday that had a majority of support in Congress.” And… “He is optimistic that there has been significant progress toward a bipartisan agreement…”
He also said that he is resuming all campaign activities, which, of course, he never actually stopped.
