None of us were around on March 4, 1933, but for the first time in my life, I can feel what that must have been like. That’s the day FDR was inaugurated just as the Great Depression was hitting its low point. Unfortunately for us, it is September 2008 and not January 2009. Barack Obama still has an election to win and then must wait 2½ months to take office.
By then, I fear it might be too late. By then, all of the promise we’ve seen in this remarkable man may have to be used to salvage what remains rather than build from a reasonable foundation.
Today will be an historic day, and not just because of the drama and uncertainty about the debate. It would surprise me if the stock market does not fall 500 points. It would not surprise me if it drops 1,000, or even dramatically more, if the framework for a bailout deal is not reached.
The reason for that can and should be laid at the clay feet of John McCain. Both sides, Democrats and Republics, had the framework of a deal in place before McCain decided to make a grandstanding move to "suspend" his campaign and ride to the rescue in Washington. It was clearly a stunt designed more to resuscitate his fading presidential hopes than to help produce a plan to help get us out of this financial crisis.
Whatever the motive, it proved to be a disaster. McCain’s dithering on the plan – he sat mostly silent while Obama tried to find consensus – gave enough cover to the conservative Republican House members who didn’t like the plan and felt political gain could be accrued by opposing it.
Well, guess what? Nobody likes the plan. It sucks. Conservative estimates are that it will cost my family of four $10,000. I have no appetite for bailing out the greedy, principle-less bastards who created this mess. But I’m also an adult. I understand that when you have a bad choice and a worse choice, you take the bad choice. You can’t be a child and stomp off to your room because you got served broccoli for dinner. That’s what the Republicans in the House have done, given cover by McCain. They may think they can gain political points off of this. They hope to get the votes of the people angry about the bailout. They hope that voters don’t make the connection that the Republicans, thanks to their worshipping at the altar of deregulation, are the ones who caused this mess. We’ll see how effective that strategy will look after the market collapses today.
It might be different if McCain had a coherent plan to deal with this crisis. He doesn’t. He couldn’t even be bothered to read Paulson’s original plan, all of three pages. He has careened so wildly from "fundamentals are sound" to "sky is falling" that he’s impossible to take seriously.
As for today, does he show up for the debate? Who knows? Anyone who expects McCain to do the rational thing is deluding themselves by now. Somehow, I think he’ll make the dramatic play and decide at the last minute to debate. We’ll have CNN and the rest breathlessly document his plane’s arrival like we watched O.J.’s Bronco. Johnny Hero has arrived! I cannot imagine his ego would allow him to cede the stage to Obama for 90 minutes.
I believe the die has been cast for this election. I cannot believe that this electorate, uninformed as it may be, will turn to a losing-it 72-year-old with no economic expertise, especially when Palin is in the wings. But I fear that the damage done to this country as a result of McCain’s shenanigans may make President Obama’s job almost impossible. We can only hope that the intellect, temperament and ability to inspire that drew us to this man can save the day -- and the country.