John McCain finally stopped doing interviews and kibbitzing with folks at the Clinton Global Initiative to make his "emergency" return to Capitol Hill today, but the reporting suggests his presence wasn't exactly a profile in presidential-style leadership:
Senator John McCain had intended to ride back into Washington on Thursday as a leader who had put aside presidential politics to help broker a solution to the financial crisis. Instead he found himself in the midst of a remarkable partisan showdown, lacking a clear public message for how to bring it to an end.
At the bipartisan White House meeting that Mr. McCain had called for a day earlier, he sat silently for more than 40 minutes, more observer than leader, and then offered only a vague sense of where he stood, said people in the meeting.
In subsequent television interviews, Mr. McCain suggested that he saw the bipartisan plan that came apart at the White House meeting as the proper basis for an eventual agreement, but he did not tip his hand as to whether he would give any support to the alternative put on the table by angry House Republicans, with whom he had met before going to the White House.
He said he was hopeful that a deal could be struck quickly and that he could then show up for his scheduled debate on Friday night against his Democratic rival in the presidential race, Senator Barack Obama. But there was no evidence that he was playing a major role in the frantic efforts on Capitol Hill to put a deal back together again.
On the second floor of the Capitol on Thursday night, Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina and one of Mr. McCain’s closest confidants, complained to a throng of reporters that Democrats were using Mr. McCain as a scapegoat for the failure of the rescue package. But Mr. Graham was met with a barrage of questions on why Mr. McCain never explicitly said he favored the bailout proposal.
The situation was evolving so rapidly that it was all but impossible to judge the political implications; with the government under intense pressure to avoid another breach in confidence in the global financial markets, it was possible that a deal could be struck without further reshaping the campaign and that Mr. McCain could still be able to claim a role in a positive outcome.
Still, as a matter of political appearances, the day’s events succeeded most of all in raising questions about precisely why Mr. McCain had called for postponing the first debate and returned to Washington to focus on the bailout plan, and what his own views were about what should be done. Those political appearances are a key consideration for Mr. McCain less than six weeks from Election Day and at a time when some polls suggest he is losing ground against Mr. Obama, especially on handling the economy. Meanwhile, the day gave Obama the chance to look presidential:
by nightfall, the day provided the younger and less experienced Mr. Obama an opportunity to, in effect, shift roles with Mr. McCain. For a moment, at least, it was Mr. Obama presenting himself as the old hand at consensus building, and as the real face of bipartisan politics.
“What I’ve found, and I think it was confirmed today, is that when you inject presidential politics into delicate negotiations, it’s not necessarily as helpful as it needs to be,” Mr. Obama told reporters Thursday evening. “Just because there is a lot of glare of the spotlight, there’s the potential for posturing or suspicions.”
“When you’re not worrying about who’s getting credit, or who’s getting blamed, then things tend to move forward a little more constructively,” he said. So far, all John McCain has proved is that he has neither control nor influence over the right wing of his party, even having dangled the shiny (well, after that dreadful Katie Couric interview, somewhat less shiny...) Sarah Palin object in front of them. And he has no more influence over the process than does the lamest of lame ducks, President Bush. He exerted no leadership in the meeting, which in itself apparently helped blow up the process that had been well underway before McCain showed up. And now, right wing Republicans, led by the Boner, are actually proposing a regime of more tax cuts, and the complete elimination of regulations on Wall Street as their version of a fix, plus forcing banks to buy private insurance. Seriously.
In short, what leadership has McCain exercised, and how can his supporters argue that he has made things better, not worse?
Tonight, the WaPo's Chris Cilizza is reporting that a memo released by the suspended? but curiously still operable McCain campaign indicates that McCain won't be attending tomorrow night's debate. Okay, and his continued presence in Washington, given that he is on neither of the relevant Senate committees, Banking and Financial Services, and that his only chance to lead was a bust, what is it that he'll be doing?
Of course, it is possible (and in my opinion, somewhat likely) that the Bush administration is overstating the crisis, in order to make one last grab for power, and for a last dash at emptying what's left in the treasury on behalf of their fat cat friends -- sort of a "shock doctrine" applied to finance, as it was to war. That could be. But with Washington Mutual going under on Thursday, no one in Washington is going to want to be blamed for an economic meltdown, should it turn out the Bushies aren't lying for once.
And now, for a word from E.J. Dionne: in "My country for a photo" he summarizes things as follows:
McCain's boisterous intervention -- and particularly his grandstanding on the debate -- was less a presidential act than the tactical ploy of a man worried that his chances of becoming president might be slipping away. John McCain has mastered the rhetoric and appearance of bi-partisanship. But at this point, the only evidence of it is his constant sidekicking with Joe Lieberman (isn't that "tripartisan?") If McCain claims to be the king of bipartisan leadership, he should start by leading his own caucus. If he can't do that, then he should do us all a favor and just go to Ole Miss.
Labels: 2008 election, Barack Obama, John McCain, presidential candidates |
