Barack Obama has stayed largely silent on the issue. The only thing he has shown in the way of a plan is re hashing another stimulus package of $50 billion. Not only did the last stimulus package fail but a stimulus package does nothing to address the inherent problems in our financial market. One of the criticisms of Barack Obama is that he has never really been in a position of leadership. As part of this criticism, opponents point out that he often is far too deliberate to be a President. Indecisiveness is one of the worst traits to have in a President. One of the reasons that Senators so rarely become President is because the deliberating body creates a culture of indecisiveness. Now, Barack Obama has spent the last week and a half on the sidelines of what will likely become the most important issue in the campaign. In so doing, his silence revealed a truth just as much as someone's off handed comment might reveal.
This presents John McCain with an opportunity. He has a plan. He needs to go out and sell that plan, however, he also needs to point out that his opponent has done nothing but criticize. Criticism is not a luxury a President will have. This is what he needs to do over and over.
Earlier Tuesday, he charged that Obama had shown a lack of leadership by staying "mum" on the financial crisis -- an accusation the Obama campaign called "laughable."
McCain's campaign released a television ad Tuesday that builds on McCain's argument that Obama is not ready to lead.
"In crisis, experience matters. McCain and his Congressional allies led," an announcer says in the 30-second spot.
"Obama and his liberal allies? Mum on the market crisis," the announcer says.
Words beside a picture of Obama read "no leadership" as the announcer says, "A risk your family can't afford."
It appears that Obama saw McCain's gaffe, when he said the fundamentals were strong, and he thought that he could ride that gaffe to victory. McCain has an opportunity to use his Obama's silence against him. McCain needs to hammer the difference home ad nauseum. McCain has a plan, and Obama has criticism. That is the long and short of it. This is the sort of thing that McCain needs to hammer over and over...
What exactly will Obama do in response? Will he criticize McCain's plan? Can you imagine how it will go over if Obama is criticizing McCain and offers absolutely nothing himself? Obama is in danger of looking like the worst kind of critic. He has criticized Bush, McCain, the D.C. culture, and now when it is time for action he is entirely silent. This is McCain's opportunity and he must act on it and expose Obama's critic's mentality. If I were McCain, I would start a running clock on my site counting down the days since this crisis started and since Obama's been silent with any solution. If I were John McCain, this is what I would be saying over and over.
In response to this crisis, I proposed the creation of the Mortgage Financial Institution Trust. This would be a new Treasury Department that would help companies in trouble navigate out of trouble before they are on the verge of collapse. We need to make sure that we never put ourselves in this position again. In response to the same crisis, my opponent offered absolutely nothing. That's not leadership. A President needs to be decisive. I saw the crisis and I acted. Barack Obama saw the crisis and he watched. He is simply not ready to lead.
Obama's silence must be the subject of ads, speeches, and debate material as well. If I were John McCain, I would make Barack Obama's silence on this crisis the subject of a full court press attack.
12 comments:
So this is the story the right wing and the Mccain campaign will try to spin, that Obama is offering "no plan," unlike Mccain. This is absurd in numerous respects. First of all, Obama came out with a number of ideas the day after the crisis hit, in his press conference, the same day Mccain held a press conference not to put forward ideas but to bash Obama with baseless, petty, petulant political insults. And then to call for firing the SEC chairman, a cheap political gimmick call, not the "plan" of someone who is really trying to think and deliberate on how to best resolve the crisis, who cares about a plant that would actually work, rather than try to get political advantage with a cheapshot. Then, from your post it seems you would rather have a detailed, line-by-line plan put out "immediately" than a presidential candidate who first absorbs all the information, and thinks and deliberates before offering a detailed line-by-line plan that would have a better chance of working (as more thought would be put into it). You say immediate "decisiveness" is the crucial factor of a president; I think decisiveness after *thinking* things out, to enact a well thought-out plan is the crucial factor. And the final point to make is that Mccain's has not in fact offered any detailed line-by-line plan any more than Obama; this "MFI" proposal is just a cheap, on the fly gimmick. So this whole story that Mccain is trying to spin about him offering a "plan" and Obama not offering one is yet another cheap, hollow illusion that I hope the voters will see right through.
"Obama came up with a number of ideas" and yet you couldn't actually name any of them specifically. If there really are a "number of ideas" why did skip over the part where you mentioned one of them specifically.
This is a financial crisis and I hate to break to you but being deliberate and being President don't go together. The reality is that Obama has offered nothing. He said he would and then changed his mind and offered nothing. If he did you would have said something specific and not "a number of ideas".
Well, for instance, in that press conference Obama sketched out the need to reverse deregulation policies (of the sort engineered by Mccain's economic policy guru Phil Gramm) to prevent this sort of crisis from emerging again. You'll note that early on as this crisis emerged, speaking "from their hip," the Mccain campaign initially touted the need to remove "burdensome" regulations to help the economy; they kept changing their message before eventually settling on Obama's prior main ideas of regulation, the need to limit CEO's "bonus" pay if they participate in the bailout program, etc. Just compare Mccain's press conference today to the one held earlier in the day by Obama; the main gist of Mccain's is a carbon copy of Obama's. Mccain is no "leader," he's a pathetic old man who is basically checking what Obama does first in this situation, cheaply copies his approach, and then ironically accuses him of having "no ideas." And we all know Mccain's doing this mimicking only for rhetorical purposes; we all know he's lying and he's going to continue the policy of extreme deregulation and "trickle down" economics if he's elected. I tell you he will run this country to the ground if elected, destroying the middle class turning us into a third-world country by making the extremely rich get more and more rich, and suck out economic resources from everyone else to do this.
Which deregulation and what would reversing it do? Are you serious? Limiting CEO pay for a bailout, who cares. While those scum suckers don't deserve it, limiting their payout is miniscule in the larger scheme of things.
Obama has been blaming "deregulation" for a long time. Deregulation is not a specific policy. You can't limit deregulation but a specific regulation. What is that specific regulation? Obama never says.
Well look, I'm sure if he offered specific, detailed legislation then folks like you on the right would be taking the opposite tactic and accuse him of acting "presumptively" as if he were already president. He's outlined a conceptual approach to the problem and a general framework, not specific bills. Then again, that's basically what Mccain has done as well. But if you insist on a specific detail, he has pointed out that the Gramm-Leach-Bliley deregulatory act has contributed to this crisis, and so his policy would be to reverse that law.
And limiting CEO "golden parachutes" and whatnot is not a trivial detail, or just a punitive measure. It helps ensure that the money the companies get from the taxpayers is used wisely, not wasted, but helping to shore up the collapsing financial system, the purported purpose of the bailout.
Are you serious? First, you claim that he offered specifics, then, when you can't find any specifics you say that I would attack him anyway. What a partisan you are.
There is absolutely nothing presumptious about a Presidential candidate and current member of Congress offering a specific plan to counteract a financial crisis.
Mike,
This is a terrific post. The best I've read here. This line;
"Criticism is not a luxury a President will have."
is dead on. You can harp and carp, criticize and yammer, but ultimately a president has to propose and decide.k
Anonymous criticizes Gramm-Leach et al. This shows how little he knows and how he/she is just regurgitating talking points from HuffKos. Clinton signed that legislation. Rubin ( a key BO economic advisor) advocated for it and Biden, Kerry and the rest voted for it.
The seeds of this destruction were sown by Fannie and Freddie.
To Chris: I know that Clinton signed it, and that is a stain on his legacy, and a failure on the part of all senators voting for it. Nonetheless the bill was crafted by Republicans and their "help those with the most get more" philosophy. It is doubtful a bill like that would have ever been written and crafted by democrats.
To Mike: I offered a specific plan of his. Another plan he outlined is to form a board to monitor the market and to predict impending crises, so that they may be averted (I believe this is yet another idea copied by Mccain). He sketched out numerous other proposals in laborious detail in that speech that shortly followed the crisis. Look up the 40-minute long video on youtube. Mccain has no plan, except for a plan to somehow flip reality and turn this into his advantage by ironically saying Obama has no plan. A plan for his campaign, not the country. Oh, and calling me a partisan is the pot calling the kettle black, needless to say.
First, since Mr./Ms. Anonymous left a mack truck opening, I am taking it. The only stain on Clinton's record comes in the color blue. All right, I just couldn't resist.
As to the substance of your argument, we should all first notice that your position has shifted once and shifted back. First, you argued that Obama does have a plan. Then, you proclaimed that if he offered something specific I would cut it up, which I would just like I cut up McCain's specific plan. Now, you are back to arguing that he does have specifics but still have a hard time mentioning them.
This supposed panel is not Obama's plan but McCain's. Obama has no plan. Major Garrett reported as much and he quoted sources from the Obama campaign. They told him that Obama thought it would make more sense to simply try and beat McCain over the head with his gaffe about the strong economy than to provide specifics. That's from the Obama campaign.
As for me, I have a plan myself.
http://theeprovocateur.blogspot.com/2008/09/my-alternatives-to-bailout.html
and
http://theeprovocateur.blogspot.com/2008/07/mortgage-fraud-problem-and-solutions.html
and so does McCain and that is more than we can say for Obama.
As for this deregulation banking bill, you likely have no idea what it did even as you proclaim it a stain on Clinton's legacy. What it did was break down the figurative wall between banks and financial services institutions. Is that bad? If it is tell me why. You likely have no idea. As you consider how horrible this bill is just keep in mind the next time you are in your bank and you are happy with their service that if this bill is reversed, you won't be allowed to do your investment with them. Keep in mind that if you are happy with your broker or insurance company, you won't be allowed to have more financial services with them. That's what this bill allowed. This is what you call a "stain".
The wall between commercial and investment banking removed by the Gramm-Leach-Bliley was critical in preventing dubious investments with savings in commercial banks, and similar gamings of the system leading to insecure savings, the kind of activities that occurred in the 1920's. That is why the wall was erected in the first place, in 1933, with the Glass-Steagall act. The consolidation of commercial and investment banking is a huge reason of why we find ourselves teetering on the edge of a second Great Depression today.
Can you use any more vague intelligent sounding words? I don't know what that means? What sorts of dubious investment are those? How does a separation stop dubious investment? Do the investments stop being dubious just because the government forbids certain institutions from making them? It does no such thing.
The wall didn't stop any such thing. It isn't as though these so called "dubious investments" weren't available. They just couldn't be made by banks. I hate to break it to you but no regulation can stop recklessness, carelessness, and greed. The wall didn't stop "dubious investments". That is just plain nonsense. There are all sorts of "dubious investments" that banks could make, they just couldn't make them in any other part of financial services. The wall separated banks from all other financial services companies, and often financial services companies from each other. So again, if you want the government to forbid you from having all your money at one institution because you like the way that institution handles your money then support this being regulated, because then, your bank won't be able to handle your investments, mortgages, and insurance. That's what this legislation did. I have already written about it.
http://theeprovocateur.blogspot.com/2008/09/bank-deregulation-and-financial.html
Just so we are all clear, what happened in the 1920's was that folks were buying stocks on 90% margin. They put down ten percent and borrowed the rest. Almost always they didn't actually have all the rest of the money. Once the market tanked, their margins were called and of course they didn't have the money.
Furthermore, making sure that massive financial institutions don't make dubious investments is NOT something that a regulation can stop. You can't make a regulation against "dubious" investments. It is something that proper oversight is supposed to stop. The entire market was being fed fraudulent loans and no one did anything. It wasn't a lack of regulations, but a lack of enforcement of the basic regulation against fraud.
Post a Comment