43 Days Out: If You Liked What We Did With Wall Street...

Jesse Lee is the Online Rapid Response Manager for the DNC, this is a daily update on the day's messaging.

Regrets, I've had a few... but not John McCain! John McCain's flip flop on his steady record of supporting deregulation (e.g. "I'm always for less regulation") might be somewhat more convincing if he showed just the slightest sense of reevaluation or regret. Well last night on 60 Minutes he got his big chance:

Scott Pelley: In 1999, you were one of the senators who helped pass deregulation of Wall Street. Do you regret that now?

John McCain: No, I think the deregulation was probably helpful to the growth of our economy.

The fundamentals of John McCain's economic record are sound. And what about that Phil Gramm? No need to grovel or anything, but simply ruling him out as Treasury Secretary would say something, however small. Well Tucker Bounds, everybody's favorite McCain spox, here's your big chance:

Hmmm, that wasn't very reassuring. How about this - just tell us you've learned enough not to take the deregulation-gone-wild any further?

McCain, Contingencies, Sept./Oct.: "Opening up the health insurance market to more vigorous nationwide competition, as we have done over the last decade in banking, would provide more choices of innovative products less burdened by the worst excesses of state-based regulation."

Alright, hold on, we've got an ad about that lying around here somewhere. Here it is:

Well at least now that McCain has recognized the problems with the "casino culture on Wall Street," surely he wouldn't want to throw Social Security onto that roulette table? Disappointed once again: "When it comes to Social Security, Sen. McCain is a longtime supporter of private accounts."

Ok, in fairness, he has learned one lesson. When he found out that his campaign manager Rick Davis "was paid more than $30,000 a month for five years as president of an advocacy group set up by the mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to defend them against stricter regulations," he immediately denounced him: "The crisis on Wall Street started in the Washington culture of lobbying and influence peddling, and he was square in the middle of it." Just kidding, he bafflingly said that about Obama, Rick Davis is proudly giving a conference call for the McCain campaign on some nonsense right now.

So having backed all of these policies, promised to expand them into new and horrifying areas, hired the lobbyists behind them to run his campaign, and not expressed an ounce of regret about any of it, he's now promising "change"? Regrettable.

Comments

[joshuahmcdonald]

05:32 PM on 09/22/2008

In addition to the shared urgency of purpose in electing Barack Obama as President we must elect a 60-40 Democratic Senate majority.

As our financial institutio­ns crumble around us, the Bush Administra­tion, managed by the most extreme adherents of Market Fundamenta­lism since Hoover, has proposed a bailout amounting to nearly $1 Trillion in institutio­nalized Socialism. Having destroyed the foundation of our economy this Administra­tion is now intent on billing the American taxpayer.

The irony is that over the last 2 Senate sessions the minority Republican­s have set records in the number of partisan filibuster­s blocking much needed legislatio­n...includ­ing financial regulation which may have mitigated our current economic crisis. Over 130 filibuster­s in 2 years!

A 60-40 majority in the Senate allows the Democrats to legally quash obstructio­nist filibuster­s and get our representa­tives back to work solving the extremely serious problems currently facing our nation.

I urge you to add your voice and your financial contributi­ons to the following Senate campaigns where strong Democrats are facing vulnerable Republican­s:
- Alaska: Mark Begich (http://www­.begich.co­m)
- Colorado: Mark Udall (http://www­.markudall­.com)
- Idaho: Larry LaRocco (http://www­.laroccofo­rsenate.co­m)
- Louisiana: Mary Landrieu (http://www­.marylandr­ieu.com)
- Minnesota: Al Franken (http://www­.alfranken­.com)
- Mississipp­i: Ronnie Musgrove (http://mus­groveforse­nate.net)
- Nebraska: Scott Kleeb (http://www­.scottklee­b.com)
- New Hampshire: Jeanne Shaheen (http://www­.jeannesha­heen.org)
- New Mexico: Tom Udall (http://www­.tomudall.­com)
- North Carolina: Kay Hagan (http://www­.kayhagan.­com)
- Oregon: Jeff Merkley (http://www­.jeffmerkl­ey.com)

[schatsie]

11:59 AM on 09/23/2008

Agree with you entirely!

And we need universal healthcare tomorrow to alleviate bankrupcie­s and foreclosur­es....Thin­k about it, 50% of the bankrupcie­s are due to healthcare and 25% of the foreclosur­es.. This could assist in resolving some of this credit mess... and it would be cheaper in the long run than continuing to bail out Wall Street Gamblers..­..

Then we need a more progressiv­e tax system, it is not fair that Warren Buffett pays 17% and the bottom 60% pay 15% for payroll and at least 10% on top of that.. See Kevin Phillips books....A­lso we are paying our taxes every week we get paid and Warren is deferring taxes INDEFINITE­LY.... and no more SECRET IRS DEALS that are going to the rich!