Last night, John McCain made a remarkable claim in the economic section of the debate.
After Barack Obama explained the actions he'd taken over the past two years to warn of the coming economic crisis and urge the Administration to change course, John McCain offered this "me too" answer:
I also warned about Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and warned about corporate greed and excess, and CEO pay, and all that. A lot of us saw this train wreck coming.
But there's also the issue of responsibility. [Eisenhower story].
Somehow we've lost that accountability....We've got to start also holding people accountable .... But somehow in Washington today ... failure to carry out our responsibility is rewarded.
As president of the United States, people are going to be held accountable in my administration. And I promise you that that will happen.
John McCain "saw this train wreck coming"? When? Here he is in March 2007, heaping praise on George Bush's economic record:
He should be judged very, very well as far as the economy is concerned. We're in a long sustained period of economic growth.
- John McCain on Bush, March 5, 2007
Yup, McCain sure saw this economic "train wreck" coming.
The very month McCain made those glowing remarks about Bush's economic record, the country started seeing reports like this:
Mortgage Report Rattles Markets
A national survey showing that a soaring number of homeowners failed to make their mortgage payments in the last quarter of 2006 rattled lawmakers in Washington and the markets in New York yesterday, as the Dow Jones industrial average plummeted 2 percent, or nearly 243 points.
- Washington Post, March 14, 2007
Okay, so maybe McCain didn't really see this coming.
But he sure will hold 'em accountable. Just like he's done with the Bush Administration:
I think we are better off if you look at the entire eight year period
- John McCain, January 30, 2008
Excerpts from Yeah, Right: "This Economy Is Strong" and Other Tall Tales (pages 1, 11 & 44)
Online Sources: McCain, March 2007; Post, March 2007; McCain, January 2008