I missed the first half hour of the debate (had to go to Boy Scouts with my son) but saw the rest. John McCain needed to do a lot better tonight than he did. The game is not over, but it's now going to be much tougher for McCain to win and things weren't looking good before. A few observations:
- Tom Brokaw was absolutely abysmal. Self-important, whining, petulant and grandstanding the whole time. He was more concerned about his timekeeping and ensuring that the candidates paid fealty to the rules than letting the conservation develop to the point where a candidate might say something interesting. You want a moderator for these things - Brokaw was a gatekeeper. But it's worth remembering that only losers complain about the referees. Winners overcome bad calls.
- Obama has gotten better at debating. He's still full of balloon juice on most everything but he's very good at spouting his line, especially when he's not interrupted. And he wasn't tonight. He pretty much got to hit his marks on every question and McCain really never laid a glove on him. Obama had to look plausible and if you don't know any better (and most people don't), he did.
- McCain needed to be much better than he was. He didn't do anything egregiously bad, but he never seemed to make the killer point that would differentiate himself and make an affirmative case for why he should be elected. He kept saying that "I know how to do this." That may be, but it's argument by assertion. McCain didn't explain how he knows how to do whatever this is. More importantly, he also didn't explain why Obama won't be able to do what Obama claims he will do. That's the thing that nags me the most about Obama, besides his ridiculous policy ideas -- what evidence is there that a guy with his resume and his go-along get-along history will be able to demonstrate leadership and actually get anything done if his butt hits the seat in the Oval Office. McCain needed to hammer that point home and he didn't.
- The whole point of having a town hall forum is to get offbeat questions from the audience. We didn't get any from either the internet or the audience in the auditorium. It may as well have been the White House press corps in the room. The last two questions - about defending Israel militarily and the silly one about what the candidates don't know (a whole lot from what I can tell) - approached interesting. Of course Obama sidestepped the first one and then used his time to make a closing statement at the end. And McCain didn't do a hell of a lot better.
- If this were a football game, we'd be in the middle of the 4th quarter now. To extend the analogy, McCain is down by 11 points. He needs two scores to win. He just went 3 and out. Obama now has the ball and will try to play ball control the rest of the way. And he has an excellent offensive line in the MSM.
4 comments:
What did you think of McCain's proposal that the federal government buy up bad mortgages? My jaw dropped on that one. I can't imagine it going over well with folks on your side of the aisle.
I didn't see it since it happened in the first half hour. It looks like (via Powerline) what he's proposing is not buying up bad mortgages per se, but doing some sort of program that would let homeowners replace the bad mortgage with a new mortgage at the actual value of the property, not what it was purchased for. I've copied the text and will put it in another comment.
That very well may be a distinction without a difference, of course. I don't think it's a good idea, but I do understand why he put it out there.
It's always worth remembering that I agree with Maverick about 60-65% of the time at most. I'll have to study the matter more, but my guess is that this proposal will fall into the 35-40% of stuff that I disagree with.
Here it is - direct from Team McCain:
AMERICAN HOMEOWNERSHIP RESURGENCE PLAN
John McCain will direct his Treasury Secretary to implement an American Homeownership Resurgence Plan (McCain Resurgence Plan) to keep families in their homes, avoid foreclosures, save failing neighborhoods, stabilize the housing market and attack the roots of our financial crisis. America’s families are bearing a heavy burden from falling housing prices, mortgage delinquencies, foreclosures, and a weak economy. It is important that those families who have worked hard enough to finance homeownership not have that dream crushed under the weight of the wrong mortgage. The existing debts are too large compared to the value of housing. For those that cannot make payments, mortgages must be re-structured to put losses on the books and put homeowners in manageable mortgages. Lenders in these cases must recognize the loss that they’ve already suffered.
The McCain Resurgence Plan would purchase mortgages directly from homeowners and mortgage servicers, and replace them with manageable, fixed-rate mortgages that will keep families in their homes. By purchasing the existing, failing mortgages the McCain resurgence plan will eliminate uncertainty over defaults, support the value of mortgage-backed derivatives and alleviate risks that are freezing financial markets.
The McCain resurgence plan would be available to mortgage holders that:
· Live in the home (primary residence only)
· Can prove their creditworthiness at the time of the original loan (no falsifications and provided a down payment).
The new mortgage would be an FHA-guaranteed fixed-rate mortgage at terms manageable for the homeowner. The direct cost of this plan would be roughly $300 billion because the purchase of mortgages would relieve homeowners of “negative equity” in some homes. Funds provided by Congress in recent financial market stabilization bill can be used for this purpose; indeed by stabilizing mortgages it will likely be possible to avoid some purposes previously assumed needed in that bill.
The plan could be implemented quickly as a result of the authorities provided in the stabilization bill, the recent housing bill, and the U.S. government's conservatorship of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. It may be necessary for Congress to raise the overall borrowing limit.
What's not clear is if this is over and above what's already in the bailout. I've seen one comment that says this is simply part of the existing plan, others that say it's something new. Guess we'll find out.
Thanks for the info Mark. My understanding is that this is something that is authorized by the current plan, but not required by it.
And yeah I know you disagree with McCain on a number of things and I guessed that this would be one of them. I just don't get what the point of bringing this up was. Its going to seem like another bit of RINOism to his supporters and he didn't present it forcefully or clearly enough for it to really register with anyone else.
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