Maybe the UFO Kucinich saw was really a vulture.

WilyTrax.com

The Fear Index measuring how 'everyday' people view major markets is at an all-time intraday high. See http://finance.yahoo.com/q?s=%5Evix .

Obama's focusing on the econ vis a vis McCain is just going to be all the more effective.

There is a vacuum of leadership in most areas of government and the private sector. If Obama announces some sort of a "Economics brain trust" to prepare for Day One ... Well I think that would pretty much end the McCain campaign the moment Obama announces it.

Barry Ritholz, of The Big Picture blog (financials, economics, etc) writes, "Markets are looking ugly around the globe. Investors are voting on the bailout plan with their feet. The crisis is now accelerating.

This is a speech I'd like to hear either one of the candidates give. The man who expresses these views (or something close to it) gets my vote."

http://bigpicture.typepad.com/comments/2 008/10/plan-b.html

Definitely worth reading. Ritholz is a pragmatist and pretty "middle-of-the-road" in his politics (at least IMO).

In '92, Clinton had his patriotism challenged because he had participated as a student in war protests. At the townhall debate, Poppy Bush was given the opportunity to acknowledge that protesting government is an American freedom, and to distance himself from those who would challenge Clinton's patriotism. Instead, Poppy dug in his heels, saying protests HERE are one thing, but he believed it was wrong for Clinton (when a college student) to have participated in protests while ABROAD.

The GOP challenged Clinton's patriotism, they challenged Kerry's patriotism (and his military heroism), and now they challenge Obama's patriotism. Inasmuch as McCain promised to run a campaign based on substance, not smeers, I don't think it's a bad thing to bring up this broken promise at the debate.  

But expect that McCain, too, if given the chance to distance himself from smeer tactics, will dig himself in deeper. That didn't help Poppy, and probably won't help McCain.

A top McCain strategist on trying to change the subject:

"It's a dangerous road, but we have no choice. If we keep talking about the economic crisis, we're going to lose."

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics /2008/10/05/2008-10-

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Per MSNBC's First Read:

"Per our map, to reach 270, Obama has to hold on to the Kerry states -- winning New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin -- and pick up just one more state other than Nevada (which would get him to 269 and send the election to the House). Here's McCain's challenge: If he's unable to turn a blue state red, then he has to win every single Toss-up to get to 270. It's doable, but it's also the poker equivalent of drawing an inside straight."

http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2 008/10/06/1497767.aspx

mccain couldn't win this race if he single-handedly took out a middle-eastern terrorist strike force and defused a dirty bomb with his teeth on the washington mall.

thanks to his hard-charging (stillborn) rescue of the bailout everyone hates, even if he hauled bin laden up the capitol steps in chains, absolutely no one would think that it's not another one of his hail mary campaign stunts. he'd never get credit for it.

that's what happens when you lose all credibility, which up until now was the best thing mccain had going for him.

And, really, shouldn't the public get the benefit of another Biden-Palin debate, or even two? If there's difficulty finding a moderator, I'll be glad to volunteer.

Yes, Bill, that's an excellent idea.

In Indiana, there are 250,000 new registrations since the primary.  The population of the state is only 6 million.  A substantial percentage of the electorate will be new voters, most of them registered by Obama!!!!!

"But the McCain campaign doesn't want to lead - they're furiously, desperately trying to duck the responsibility of addressing a national crisis."

If you can give me some examples of Obama leading on this issue, I'd love to hear them.  I'm an Obama supporter (although recently less so) and have contributed money and volunteer time to the campaign.

But, really, how is what Obama's doing substantively different from what McCain is doing (i.e. voting on the bailout, encouraging others to do the same, and then badmouthing it)?

McCain is opening himself up to a threefer (one more than a "twofer") with the "character issues" card: 1)  Keating Five 2) the association issues and 3) the temper.  By the way, 3 has been shown to work in a race against McCain.  So, I don't understand using "character issues" that were already used and were duds when the stuff that could be used against you is twice as effective.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB12231550 5846605217.html#articleTabs%3Darticle

Can McCain win without Fl?

Sure, it's a false equivalence, but it works fine for Obama. To a relatively uniformed voter, they'll probably see two campaigns making guilt-by-association arguments (never mind that McCain's associations with Keating are guilt-by-guilt), and since both sides are doing, the dynamics of the race are unchanged. Since the dynamics right now are awesome for Obama, unchanged dynamics are just fine.

Definitely much more of a scare tactic for Reagan Democrats, but I am talking true Reagan Democrats.  Those people who lived through the 60s and while they were blue collar workers they were unhappy with the direction of the country.   These people are now all 55+.  I think it might help some of McCain's bleeding with older voters, I just don't see it doing a whole lot to convince younger undecided voters.