The Mailer That Put the Final Nail in the McCain Campaign Coffin

Close to 100 million Americans either received mailers last week or will be receiving them next week. It is these mailers that will put the last nail in the coffin of the McCain Pailin campaign.

It wasn't sent by Obama, nor by 527 group, not by any non-profit or even a political organization.

It didn't mention McCain or Pailin, Obama or Biden. Didn't mention taxes or Iraq, Gay Marriage or Abortion or any other campaign hot button topic.

But the personalized mailer is the single envelope that will have caused John McCain and many republican incumbents to lose their seats.

I got one addressed to my youngest son on Thursday, then another addressed to me on Friday.

Then I talked to friends, members of my synagogue, fellow activists at a local fundraiser. Just about everyone had received them. The message was the same for everyone.

The first envelope I received, for my son, was a quarterly mutual fund report -- where we have most of his college savings. The letter reported that since the beginning of the year, the savings were down over 30% -- even though the fund was a "blend" fund.

The next envelope, which I received on Friday, was a quarterly report on my IRA, also down over 30%.

These reports were sent out on September 30th, before the market dropped an additional 19%. I knew the numbers I was looking at were much worse, just ten days later.

Tens of millions of Americans have received their quarterly statements this week for IRAs, mutual funds, 401Ks. They're all getting a mailer that is causing much pain, much stress, acute realization that the economic crisis has hit home.

They're probably still arriving, as I write this, for a few more days. We've seen the result in the polls. The response will grow. The pundits, if they've guessed this is about anything else, are probably wrong.

It's hard to imagine, after eight years of Bush and primarily Republican rule, most Americans not concluding that the GOP and its approach to government and the economy caused their pain, their loss, their fear for the future.

It's hard to imagine McCain's campaign getting anywhere with their desperate gambits -- abortion this week, what, terrorism next week? Or raising taxes? They saved the average family $2,000 or $5,000 in taxes over the past eight years and cost them $35,000 or $200,000 in lost retirement savings or depreciated home value.

No. The most powerful election-affecting mailer this cycle is being sent by the financial companies that so many Americans put their trust in. Those quarterly notices are all Obama needs. If he and the DSCC and DCCC congressional campaign committees are smart, they'll run ads this week referring to those notices. They'll remind the voters who discontinued the regulations that prevented financial institutions from leveraging themselves so badly-- Henry Paulson. They'll remind voters who pushed for earlier deregulations -- Phil Gramm, McCain's primary economic mentor.

But that's all icing on the Obama celebration cake. Obama and most of the Democrats running for congress could probably sit on their hands, on their campaign funds, and do almost nothing, from this point on (they don't want people to think that, of course. They want the campaign to re-double efforts.) They will still win.

These are sad times. Reality is far more powerful than any campaign words. For the neocons, the corporatists and their theocon supporters, the chickens have indeed come home to roost -- and they've shit all over almost every American.

Now. Go out and ask anyone you talk to and tie the mailer together with the election, if they haven't tied it together for themselves yet.

Crossposted from OpEdNews.com

Follow Rob Kall on Twitter: www.twitter.com/robkall

Comments

[xandix]

I lost 15% of my IRA in September.

[MsCanadian]

I'm sorry to hear how this has affected American families, and hope that everyone will vote for Obama. He has a new vision for the country, and while it still won't be easy to bounce back, it can be done!

[justobserve]

When I saw that the CEOs earned hundred of millions and then when their companies failed, they were rewarded with hundred millions more while their employees had to fight to have their wage raise a few dollars, I thought the wealth didn't trickle down at all but it was a bluff. We must change the theory that the rich people create jobs: they do but only to a certain degree, after that it becomes modern slavery when the gap is too wide.

[Judy109]

My husband lost his job last year and instead of rolling over his 401k we cashed it out and paid cash for our home. We were advised not to do this because of the 20% penalty. Had we listened we would have lost 30% of our savings and would be paying a mortgage.

[Retrofuturistic]

I tried to take my 401K money out, but my financial advisor said if I did, I would lose 20% of it to taxes. So I left it in, and then I lost over 20% anyway. So, if I take it out now, I will lose 20% of what is left. At that point, I will only have about 50% of what it took me 29 years to save....

[TXfemmom]

Well guys, I hate to gloat, but I told my husband six months ago that either we went cash on our IRA's, 401K's, and savings or else. He kept hedging and saying I don't know, until I got on the phone and forced him to make the changes with our broker, and had them put that on CD's.

Then, I did the same at the bank, and he went to bonds in his 401K.. His 401K in cash and bonds went down 1% but at least the rest were still making, rather than losing money. After our last reports came in, and all the people in his office were moaning and groaning about how much their things had gone down, he said that he looked up and said my wife made me take a cash position with CD's six months ago, and we are up, as in the black. He said that one guy told him that he wished his wife had made him do that.

We may not be making great strides, but at least we haven't lost anything. I kept track of what we would have been in the hole had we stayed in the conservative positions we had, and we could buy a very nice care for what we would have lost.

Remember, many of us are just trying to figure out how to keep a roof over their heads and how to feed their kids and no investments to moan over.

[onenvrnos]

My husband and I were set to retire in about two years. We both had state retirements, and both of us had money in the stock market. After much discussion, we decided to "buy" time (something allowed in our state retirements) so that we could retire earlier than originally planned. Although it cost us quite a bit of money to do this, we both decided it was worth it. This was our decision prior to the market crash--we had already rolled over our IRA's/stocks etc. into CD's. All the money we spent in "buying time" to retire early would have been lost in the stock market plunge had we waited. While I am SO thankful that we barely escaped this fiasco, I can not express enough my heart-felt sympathy for those who lost their savings and retirement funds. When you work all your life to set aside money wisely and faithfully with the idea that you paid your dues so that your older years can be spent in some level of comfort rather than struggle...and then you lose to factors beyond your control...it is just devastating, to say the least. When you include the funds set aside for your children to give them a better future, it is downright sickening. I am voting straight ticket Democrat this time around to give the Democrats a majority vote and eliminate the Republicans' ability for fillibuster and non-cooperation.

[Appalled]

I got another mailing that will put the final nail in McCain's campaign coffin -- it's my mail-in ballot from the Board of Elections.

[scadabout]

We are 10 years from retiring, we have lost about half of our meager 401k.
Upside down in the house.
I have started checking out, shopping carts......probably going to need one.
Deep basket? or tall flat, with good lower storage?
Any opinions?

I want to get mine early, for modifications, and there might be a shortage.

[ScottyBob]

A person left a shopping cart on the sidewalk near my driveway... From Family Dollar, It's smaller but a deep basket all the same. Kinda sporty and it's red! I parked it in my garage beside the last car I bought... an 88 VW Scirocco16V, also red. If McCain is elected at least I'll be stylin!

[NetworkGuy]

I am following the advice of a friend. I haven't even looked at my statement. I've got a pretty good idea what it says already. I certainly don't need the additional stress of seeing the numbers in black and white. Besides, I hopefully have a couple of decades before I'll need to rely on the money. OTOH, the college savings for the kids is on a much closer horizon. That may be a very real pain in just a few years.

[reagondemocrat]

the democrats have had control of the house and senate for the last 2 years and have allowed the country to lose trillions of dollars just to buy the election and say "look what bush did".

[TomTheAlmostUgly]

The Democrats had a majority. The House and Senate Republicans had the control, because everybody knew that Bushie would veto whatever the Democrats managed to pass and the Republicans would never vote to uphold the veto. Have you been in a coma for the past two years, or do you always believe what Rush tells you?

[Shozen]

Anything they would have tried would have been either vetoed by the "Deregulator in Theft" Bush or filibusted by his croney's in the Senate.

[miles120]

A conservative friend of mine sent me a blog video blaming this entire mess on Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton. Of course, every piece of legislation signed by President Clinton was authored by a Republican congressman. That's how the process works. So it's fair to say that President Clinton had a hand in this but the initiative and execution of this entire deregulation "movement" was a conservative stillbirth.

I've said in other postings that there is a lot of middle ground between a centralized economy and laissez-faire. We all need to dump the ideology and create a regulatory environment that provides transparency and manages risk. That way we can all invest with confidence.

By the way, you spelled Reagan incorrectly...

[Ironquill]

There is a world wide financial crisis, banks failing, economies tumbling. Actually, they are worse off than we are, which is why the value of the dollar has gone up recently. In your analysis would you say that the democrats reached across the oceans and caused, for example, China's stock market to do down?, or London, or Germany? You're right in one thing, it's not just what Bush did, but what he didn't do.
Do you know what a Credit Default Swap is? It's a form of unregulated insurance. Get your mind around this. There are an estimated $40 Trillion worth of CDS's. A secret market, unknown obligations, CEO's who have already skimmed the profits on these CDS's and have retired to Boca Raton. This, my good friend ,happened on George Bush's watch, it was a regulatory failure. But Bush is different from us. When he runs the ship aground, there is always someone to excuse him. I hope you have made an awful lot of money while Bush has been President, because you're going to need it.

[Dunelm]

In 2000, I predicted that the Bush Presidency would be a disaster because everything he touched seemed to turn sour. Right now, I want to tell my Republican, Christian fundamentalist friends that they are partly responsible for this country's (and indeed much fo the world's) mess. Unfortunately, many of them still have blinders, are still brainwashed and are supporting McCain/Palin. Do people never learn? (By the way, some of these friends are very well educated, even Ivy League.) I just don't understand them.

[Sparty1]

I have those same family/friends as you. They feel that the Dems aren't God fearing, family oriented people. I know. I don't get it either. This coming from the party of closeted homosexuals, adulterers and just all around incompetent people. Hopefully, people are waking up from this craziness.

With regards to Rob's article, he's absolutely correct. We're being hit and I'm just thankful that we're not in a different situation. We've lost a lot of money from our investments and our house. We're lucky that we're in our late 30's, but what about our parents and grandparents? It's sad and scary.

[larry278]

Nobody ever lost an election or money underestimating the intelligance of the 'Murican people. I hope that Obama wins so I won't have to quote the late Dick Tuck & say, "The people have spoken, the bastards." at Xmas & New Year's Eve. Twain said "You can fool some of the people all of the time & all of the people some of the time."; it sure worked for Nixon & W.

[ewoman]

I'm almost glad I was too poor to save for my retirement. Now I can begin as one of the lowest common denominators and not go through the pain...but, I'm not immune. My parents have lost much of their retirement funds. My father, bless his heart, says, "At least we've got a roof over our heads." While that roof isn't valued at the price it was a year ago, the sentiment is priceless.

[SteveMDFP]

"They saved the average family $2,000 or $5,000 in taxes over the past eight years and cost them $35,000 or $200,000 in lost retirement savings or depreciated home value."

In truth, the Bush regime has been a disaster for everyone, rich and poor alike. The wealthy have seen their assets devalued by the falling dollar, even before real estate started collapsing. Now stocks and bonds are in the toilet, too. Bush has been bad for everyone, foreign and domestic.

McCain hasn't divorced himself from ANY of the policies and laws which have created this devastation. Suffering a bit more income tax, if it could have avoided this disaster, would have been far better for the rich.

[lisakaz2]

Yeah, I got mine. It was pretty horrible. They've been lousy all year and where I once had over 8K in one account (former job, untouched since then) it's now down about 2K. I try not to pay too much attention because it's upsetting. I just try to think that I need to write off ever having that money and hope that if/when some non-Booo$hie is in office, it might recover. That is, when I need it, it'll have value and a value more than it is right now. We'll see. I have to be in total denial mode otherwise I can't sleep.

[jotunloki]

Actually that average is only true if you are talking about median and not mean. If you are referring to the average you would get if you averaged by number of individuals, the "average" taxpayer got almost nothing from the Bush Tax Cuts.