McCain Calls Time Out, Obama Says No

UPDATE
Debate Is On - McCain Will Attend
WASHINGTON (Sept. 26) - Republican John McCain agreed to attend the first presidential debate Friday night even though Congress doesn't have a bailout deal, reversing an earlier decision to delay the forum until Washington had addressed the financial crisis.

With less than 10 hours until the debate was scheduled to start, the McCain campaign announced that the Arizona senator would travel to the University of Mississippi. The campaign said that afterward McCain would fly back to Washington to continue working on the economic crisis. ... More

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Can you imagine the reaction if Barack Obama had said "I have to suspend my campaign because the economy is in a complete mess, although less than 10 days ago I did promise the American public that the "fundamentals" of our economy were strong.

And I can't debate right now and my Vice Presidential pick can't debate right now either. Must. Focus."

Just imagine the unanimous criticism if Obama made a move like this.

And the Democratic party leadership has been critical:

For what it's worth, the man who is leading congressional Democrats in negotiating the bailout deal with the administration isn't impressed with Sen. McCain's announcement.

Rep. Barney Frank told a group of reporters outside the House chamber:

"It's the longest Hail Mary pass in the history of either football or Marys."

"I'm delighted that John is expressing himself on this issue," said Chris Dodd, chairman of the Senate Banking Committee. "I have heard form Obama numerous occasions these last couple days. I have never heard from John McCain on the issue... I'm just worried a little bit that sort of politicizing this problem, sort of flying in here, I'm beginning to think this is more of a rescue plan for John McCain and not a rescue plan for the economy."

Next thing you know, perhaps in an attempt to offer John McCain some cover, President Bush requested that both John McCain and Barack Obama appear at a meeting this afternoon. And as Dodd said in the quote above, this is not the time to inject more politics into the negotiation of bailout terms.

This morning, the market is up and Democrats are saying that they were very close to a deal yesterday before John McCain and President Bush cried 'crisis.' Even the often conservative Politico.com is reported that some Republicans found McCain's presence unnecessary.

My opinion is McCain and Obama should just let the legislators at the Capitol work. By all accounts they have been moving toward accord. We'll see what happens now.

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