— How many times will John McCain and Sarah Palin say they will end the “greed and corruption on Wall St.”? Do they forget that it was McCain’s Party and his support for Bush’s economic policies of deregulation that led to that greed and corruption? Then he tries to blame Senator Obama and his cronies? That’s laughable.
— One of my favorite quotes of the night from McCain: “Fannie and Freddie were the match, the catalyst that started this forest fire.” Um, not really. Fannie and Freddie were allowed to run rampant because of the classic Republican economic doctrine: More Dergulation! More Tax cuts! If the market can’t fix it, there isn’t a problem! If McCain really thinks Fannie and Freddie were “the match that started the fire,” I’d say that he and the rest of the Republican economic ignoramuses were the ones that stacked up the wood and kindling.
— McCain on the American worker: “They are the best and most effective and innovative workers in the world.” I have no argument with that and neither does Obama. But lest we forget, it wasn’t the American worker that screwed over the American worker. It was a long, slow process that started with Ronald Reagan and has come to a head in today’s financial crisis. It comes back to their basic economic doctrine – let’s give tax breaks to everyone at the top of the social pyramid, and let the misery “trickle down.”
— Dear John McCain, out of these three key issues, in what order would you rank them in terms of your priorities as President? Entitlement reform, healthcare and energy. McCain’s response: “Well, I think you can work on all three at once Tom.” What a surprise. McCain won’t answer a question. Thankfully Obama did.
–McCain again: The safety of our troops is “my number one priority, right after the national security of the United States.” I can’t get over the irony of this statement given that McCain and Bush’s war in Iraq seemed to show utter disdain for both, by putting our armed forces in unnecessary harm’s way over something that had nothing to do with the national security of the United States.
— Lastly, who is John McCain’s hero? Is it Ronald Reagan or Teddy Roosevelt? He said both at different points of the debate. We may never know, but I’m pretty sure that both would be insulted by the comparison.