John McCain's History of Deregulation. Plus, Keating 5 and Why We Need Obama's Style of Change NOW!!

The McCain camp is still flat-footed on this economic crisis. John McCain had a press conference today where he still had that deer in the head-lights look of panic. He is lost in the sea of a life-long record of pushing the very policies that precipitated this economic crisis. McCain has tried to tell us all that he should be president because he has experience but the experience that he has on the most important problem of our time (the economy) is bad experience. Even as late as early this month he was extolling the virtues of loose regulation:Then he tells us that he's a leader but in that press conference today he looked like a kid lost in a super store. He appeared disengaged, frustrated and wishy-washy. In contrast Barack Obama looks calm, cool and a showing a steady hand while showing compassion and flashing that engaging, comforting smile of his.

I wasn't going to bring this up on my blog but given that we are in the midst of the worst economic collapse since the great depression I think it's important. That story being John McCain's involvement in the last great economic crisis--the savings and loan collapse in the 1980's. The basics of the scandal known as the "Keating 5" are that the five politicians involved (including McCain) were accussed of improperly aiding Charles Keating Jr. who was the chairman of the Lincoln Savings and Loan Association which was the target of a federal investigation. McCain was ultimately cleared but at the very least showed "poor judgment. "

So in another time of economic emergency do we really want to turn to a guy who says that he doesn't know enough about the economy and has connections to the Keating 5 scandal where he at least showed terrible judgment? I sure don't. And since judgment has been an important issue in this election then I think it's fair and important to take into consideration McCain's poor judgement in the savings and loan scandal.

Barack Obama's message of change is even more important now that we have seen the poor judgement and irresponsible economic behavior from the many years of a Republican dominated Congress and 8 years of the Bush administration. We need to scrap our entire system of "business as usual" in Washington that has for too long favored Wall Street over Main Street. We are currently witnessing the final nail in the coffin of trickle-down Reaganomics. It is time to seize back control away from the anti-regulation fat cat crowd who have been raking in on the Bush tax cuts (which McCain supports) during a time of war and during an orgy of extreme laissez-faire policies pushed through by the Republican rulers all these years.

In that press conference mentioned earlier in this post, McCain also (yet again) defended Carly Fiorina's record at Hewlett-Packard where she cut 20,000 jobs, tanked the company and bailed out with a golden parachute "severance" package to the tune of $21-40 million. Way to surround yourself with change agents there John. Carly Fiorina is another one of the players in this economic house of cards crashing down around us. She is exactly the kind of player that represents the fat cat CEO crowd that runs the McCain campaign. She needs to be fired and so does John McCain by the American people with no golden parachute to land him into the White House.