McCain Can't Rally His Own Party 4 Votes
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| Mon, 09-29-2008 - 4:24pm |
McCain's own party doesn't listen to him. How is he supposed to "reach" across the aisle and "work" for the American people? Barack got 2/3 support. Which one has more clout? And once the American people vote out the GOP dead weight, more responsible GoP leadership should come. All McCain wants to do is point fingers, mark down names, and blame, blame, blame.
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0908/14088.html
McCain takes credit for bill before it loses
By MIKE ALLEN | 9/29/08 3:37 PM EDT
“I've never been afraid of stepping in to solve problems for the American people, and I'm not going to stop now,†John McCain told a rally in Columbus, Ohio.
Photo: AP
Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and his top aides took credit for building a winning bailout coalition – hours before the vote failed and stocks tanked.
The rush to claim he had engineered a victory now looks like a strategic blunder that will prolong the McCain’s campaign’s difficulty in finding a winning message on the economy.
Shortly before the vote, McCain had bragged about his involvement and mocked Sen. Barack Obama for staying on the sidelines.
“I've never been afraid of stepping in to solve problems for the American people, and I'm not going to stop now,†McCain told a rally in Columbus, Ohio. “Sen. Obama took a very different approach to the crisis our country faced. At first he didn't want to get involved. Then he was monitoring the situation.â€
McCain, grinning, flashed a sarcastic thumbs up.
“That's not leadership. That's watching from the sidelines,†he added to cheers and applause.
Wisely, in retrospect, McCain initially had been more modest. On Sunday, he said on ABC’s “This Week†that congressional negotiators deserve “great credit†for the bipartisan deal. “"It wasn’t because of me,†McCain said. “They did it themselves.â€
But at almost the same time, McCain senior adviser Steve Schmidt was saying on NBC’s “Meet the Pressâ€: “What Sen. McCain was able to do … was to help get all of the parties to the table. There had been announcements by Senate leaders saying that a deal had been reached earlier in the week. There were no votes for that deal.
“Sen. McCain knew time was short and he came back, he listened and he helped put together the framework of getting everybody to the table, which was necessary to produce a package to avoid a financial catastrophe for this country.â€
On Monday morning, McCain campaign communications director Jill Hazelbaker said on Fox News that the deal would not have happened “without Sen. McCain.â€
“Sen. McCain interrupted his campaign, suspended his campaign activity to come back to Washington to get Republicans around a table,†Hazelbaker said. “Without Sen. McCain, House Republicans would not have appointed a negotiator, which would not have moved this bill forward.
“It’s really Sen. McCain who got all parties around a table to hammer out a deal that hopefully is in the best interests of the American taxpayer.â€
After the vote, commentators were harsh. MSNBC’s Chris Matthews said: “He’s like a cavalry commander who said ‘Charge!’ and the Republicans went into retreat.â€
Edited 9/29/2008 4:59 pm ET by niteowl08


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Sorry for leaving that out, but FYI, typing the title of the article into a search engine will bring up several matches.
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0908/14088.html
Just saw that interview myself, and he wouldn't take questions.
Do you know how many Dem votes would have resulted in this passing?
((Whatever, John, you were in favor of this bill, be a leader within your own party and get it done;))
Exactly.
It would have taken 12 votes, the votes the Republican leadership thought they had, but didn't; and if the Democrats had gotten 12 more votes, it would have passed too.
I have really been listening to the way the system works today, and this is what I learned.
I did not have enough room to type the word FOR, so I used the number 4 instead. Only 12 votes were needed from the GOP side. The GOPers first said that they would vote, then changed their minds. But over half of the democrats voted as promised.
The GOP just wants to embarrass Nancy P. The GOP is very immature. So, 12 GoPers feelings were hurt by mean ole' Nancy who injected partisanship. Duh, it's ALL about partisanship, so the GOP need to GROW UP, stop being wimps and afraid to lose their seats back home, and vote yes. After all, thier lame duck Bush43 needs their help. They voted him in, now back him up.
Edited 9/29/2008 6:13 pm ET by niteowl08
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