Should McCain ask Sarah Palin to step aside?
[cnn-photo-caption image= http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2008/images/09/29/art.palin.vp.gi.jpg caption="Palin is being criticized by conservatives and liberals alike on her lack of knowledge on economic and foreign policy."]
FROM CNN's Jack Cafferty:
The chorus of calls for Governor Sarah Palin to step aside as John McCain's vice presidential candidate is getting louder in the wake of that disastrous interview Palin did with Katie Couric.
Kathleen Parker, a well-respected conservative columnist writes on The National Review website that, after watching Palin's recent media appearances, her "cringe reflex" is exhausted.
She says that Palin's interviews with ABC's Charles Gibson, Fox News' Sean Hannity and CBS's Katie Couric have, quote, "all revealed an attractive, earnest, confident candidate. Who is clearly out of her league."
Parker admits she'd been pulling for Palin as a woman and as a conservative, but her lack of understanding of economic and foreign policy issues is troubling. Parker now says " If B.S. were currency, Palin could bail out Wall Street herself."
Here’s my question to you: Should John McCain ask Sarah Palin to step aside?
Interested to know which ones made it on air?
Is Biden an asset or a liability for Obama?
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FROM CNN's Jack Cafferty:
Senator Joe Biden is never at a loss for words. That is both the good news and the bad news.
See not everything Biden says is helpful to the Democrats' cause.
Example: He told the CBS Evening News this week that in 1929 "when the stock market crashed, Franklin D. Roosevelt got on the television and didn't just talk about the, you know, princes of greed. He said, 'Look, here's what happened,'"
Only FDR wasn't in office in 1929 and there wasn't any television then either.
In the same interview, he called an Obama ad attacking McCain as computer illiterate "terrible." Last week, he criticized the government bailout of AIG without checking with the campaign first. Barack Obama later said, quote, "I think Joe should have waited."
There's more. Biden said that paying higher taxes was the patriotic duty of the rich. And earlier this month he told a crowd that Hillary Clinton may have been a better vice presidential pick than he was. Like we said…never at a loss for words.
Here’s my question to you: Is Joe Biden an asset or a liability for Barack Obama?
Interested to know which ones made it on air?
Has the financial crisis changed your mind on who to vote for?
Click the play button to see what Jack and our viewers had to say. (PHOTO CREDIT: GETTY IMAGES)
FROM CNN's Jack Cafferty:
There is a chorus of voices suggesting we should be very afraid:
President Bush, "Our entire economy is in danger."
Treasury Secretary Paulson, the average American "should be scared."
Warren Buffett called the turmoil in the markets an "economic Pearl Harbor."
Former GE chair Jack Welch says America's in for "one hell of a deep downturn."
Not exactly the easiest climate for the next president to start his new job in...
And yet two men– Senator John McCain and Senator Barack Obama– still want the job.
Watch: Cafferty: Economy and voting
John McCain announced late yesterday he was suspending his campaign and rushing back to Washington. He called for tomorrow's debate to be postponed. Obama and McCain put out a joint statement calling for a bipartisan effort to deal with the crisis. But lawmakers beat them to the punch without the benefit of campaign politics.
Now it's back to the campaign trail for Obama and McCain-with both of them trying to convince us he knows more about fixing this mess than the other guy.
Here’s my question to you: Has the deepening financial crisis changed your mind on who to vote for for president?
Interested to know which ones made it on air?
Should the first presidential debate be postponed?
Click the play button to see what Jack and our viewers had to say.
FROM CNN's Jack Cafferty:
Senator John McCain suddenly announced this afternoon he is suspending his campaign and returning to Washington to lend a hand in the search for a solution to the nation’s deepening financial crisis.
President Bush is expected to address the nation later this evening and try to convince Americans the situation is so dire that Congress must pass the proposed $700 billion bailout bill. Trouble is, the public isn’t so sure it wants to hand the government another blank check for that much money.
McCain has also called for the postponement of the first presidential debate scheduled for this Friday night in Mississippi.
Watch: Cafferty: Postpone 1st debate?
Barack Obama says the debate should go on as scheduled. It might be helpful, particularly to voters who remain undecided, to hear the two men who want to lead the country for the next four years discuss their ideas for solving what is arguably the worst financial crisis to hit the United States since the Great Depression.
Here’s my question to you: In light of the financial crisis, should the first presidential debate be postponed?
Interested to know which ones made it on air?
What will you look for at the Presidential debates?
[cnn-photo-caption image= http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2008/images/09/23/art.debate.split.gi.jpg caption="CNNs most recent polls have Obama at 49% and McCain at 44%."]
FROM CNN's Jack Cafferty:
With the polls tightening, the stakes for the upcoming presidential debates are getting higher. The first of three debates is set for this Friday in Mississippi. Despite all that is already known about John McCain and Barack Obama, presidential debates are famous for sometimes producing a moment that will change the outcome of the election. The pressure is definitely on.
The Wall Street Journal reports that Obama's advisers are looking for ways for Obama to provoke McCain's anger or to show that he's out of touch with the average American. McCain's advisers are coaching McCain to pounce on certain phrases Obama may say like "as I’ve said before..." A McCain aid told The Journal Obama uses that phrase on occasions where he's actually changed his mind.
The first debate was supposed to cover domestic issues, but both campaigns agreed to change it to foreign policy. McCain's camp feels foreign policy is his strong suit. Obama's advisers want to hold off on a domestic issues debate because they believe Obama will have the upper hand in that discussion.
Here’s my question to you: What will you be looking for when you watch the debates?
Interested to know which ones made it on air?
Will the financial crisis change your vote in November?
Click the play button to see what Jack and our viewers had to say. (PHOTO CREDIT: GETTY IMAGES)
FROM CNN's Jack Cafferty:
For those of you keeping score at home, so far this year, the U.S. Government has agreed to shell out about $800 billion in loans and bailout packages. That includes everything from the $300 billion to help struggling homeowners refinance mortgages they shouldn't have gotten in the first place to the $85 billion loan Uncle Sam is extending insurance giant AIG.
Not exactly chump change…
On Tuesday, John McCain said he opposed a taxpayer bailout of AIG but changed his tune a day later, saying the government had no choice but to come to the rescue.
Watch: Cafferty: Economy and Voting?
Barack Obama hasn't directly addressed the bailout question. But Obama contends that the anti-regulatory stance of Republicans in Congress is the reason why we're in this mess. And while his VP candidate Joe Biden said Tuesday he did not think the government should rescue AIG, the Obama-Biden camp acknowledged a day later, it had to be done to protect the economy.
Here’s my question to you: Has the growing financial crisis changed your mind about who to vote for for president?
Interested to know which ones made it on air?
Will McCain’s statements about the economy cost him the election?
Click the play button to see what Jack and our viewers had to say.
FROM CNN's Jack Cafferty:
We awoke this morning to news the government is loaning the nation's largest insurance company, AIG, 85 billion dollars to keep it afloat.
Then we sat back and watched the bottom continue to fall out of the stock market.
The former Chairman of the Federal Reserve, Alan Greenspan, said we are experiencing a "once in a century financial crisis." which may be why democratic strategist and CNN political commentator James Carville said on the Situation Room yesterday that the comment from John McCain on Monday about the economy being “fundamentally sound” was a game changer.
Watch: Cafferty: Fatal McCain error?
That was the day that Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy and the Dow lost more ground than it had in seven years.
Carville said unless something totally out of the ordinary happens, the stupidity of McCain's remark virtually assures Obama of a win in November.
Oh, and you probably won't be seeing much of McCain adviser Carly Fiorina in the future either.
She told a radio host yesterday that neither John McCain nor Sarah Palin, quote, "could run a corporation."
That's the kind of stuff you expect the Democrats to say.
Here’s my question to you: Was John McCain's statement that the economy is fundamentally sound a fatal error?
Interested to know which ones made it on air?
Obama: Race a factor?
Click the play button to see what Jack and our viewers had to say. (PHOTO CREDIT: GETTY IMAGES)
FROM CNN's Jack Cafferty:
Race is arguably the biggest issue in this election, and it's one that nobody's talking about.
The differences between Barack Obama and John McCain couldn't be more well-defined. Obama wants to change Washington. McCain is a part of Washington and a part of the Bush legacy. Yet the polls remain close. Doesn't make sense…unless it's race.
Time magazine's Michael Grunwald says race is the elephant in the room. He says Barack Obama needs to tread lightly as he fights back against the McCain-Palin campaign attacks.
Watch: Cafferty: Is race a factor?
He writes, "Over the past 18 months, Obama has been attacked as a naive novice, an empty suit, a tax-and-spend liberal, an arugula-grazing élitist and a corrupt ward heeler, but the only attacks that clearly stung him involved the Rev. Jeremiah Wright – attacks that portrayed him as an angry black man under the influence of an even angrier black man."
The angry black man, he goes on to say, doesn't have broad appeal in White America. And even though the makeup of our population is changing, whites are still the majority in this country. How ironic that the giant step forward of nominating an African American for president may ultimately keep us mired in the past.
Here’s my question to you: Will Barack Obama's race cost him the White House?
Interested to know which ones made it on air?
Which candidate is better equipped to handle the financial crisis?
Can McCain or Obama better handle the country's financial crisis? (PHOTO CREDIT: GETTY IMAGES)
FROM CNN's Jack Cafferty:
Former Chairman of the Federal Reserve, Alan Greenspan is calling it a "once in a century" financial crisis.
Lehman Brothers– one of the oldest investment banks on wall street– has filed for bankruptcy after it failed to find a buyer. Another financial institution, Merrill Lynch is being bought by Bank of America. And insurance giant AIG– the largest insurer in the country– is desperately trying to raise cash in order to stay in business. The stock market took a huge hit today...Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are already under federal takeover-their stock is worthless...And Wilbur Ross-a billionaire investor-predicts we could see 1,000 bank failures in the months ahead.
"Change" and "reform" are two words we hear a lot of on the campaign trail. When it comes to our financial system, we need both. And it seems clear that things are going to get worse before they start to get better.
Here’s my question to you: Which candidate is better able to handle a "once in a century" financial crisis?
Interested to know which ones made it on air?
Does Palin help or hurt McCain?
On October 2, Sarah Palin and Joe Biden will have a vice presidential debate (PHOTO CREDIT: GETTY IMAGES)
FROM CNN's Jack Cafferty:
Sarah Palin electrified that crowd of Republican delegates and supporters last night in St. Paul.
The little known Alaska Governor – who was thrust into the spotlight last week as John McCain's running mate – went on the attack against Barack Obama as well as the media and the so-called Washington elite, while praising McCain. She introduced her family and painted herself as someone who can relate to small town, working-class Americans. Palin described herself as an outsider to Washington – an "average hockey mom" who joined the local PTA which started her rise to governor.
But when it came to solutions to America's myriad problems, Palin was noticeably lacking. She stuck mostly to what she knows: energy. And although she claimed to be as qualified as Obama to be president, Palin didn't tell us what exactly she would do as vice president, a job whose description she wasn't quite clear on just one month ago.
Last night was part one for Palin, and she proved she can rally the base in a way that McCain can't. But, she still hasn't faced questions from the media – which presumably will happen at some point now that she's hitting the campaign trail. At some point Palin will be forced to deal with events that are less scripted and less friendly than last night's. On October 2, she and Joe Biden will tangle in the vice presidential debate where his foreign policy experience dwarfs hers.
Here’s my question to you: Does Sarah Palin help or hurt John McCain's chances of becoming president?
Interested to know which ones made it on air?
@jackcafferty on Twitter
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