Greetings;
The third debate at Hofstra was more exciting than the last debate. Barack did a great job, and now it's Joe Biden's turn to be proud - of Barack.
I've discovered that listening to the debate by radio - or reading the transcript - allows one to detect fear and incoherence that might have been missed when watching the debate. When listening via radio, I found that McCain sounded afraid. His voice was very shaky.
In addition, a look at the transcript suggests McCain couldn't (or wouldn't) answer the first question which was: Why is your economic plan better than [your opponents]? Here is the transcript from that question and McCain's response:
Shieffer: We will ask both of you: Why is your plan better than his?
Sen. McCain, you go first.
McCain: Well, let -- let me say, Bob, thank you.
And thanks to Hofstra.
And, by the way, our beloved Nancy Reagan is in the hospital tonight, so our thoughts and prayers are going with you.
It's good to see you again, Sen. Obama.
Americans are hurting right now, and they're angry. They're hurting, and they're angry. They're innocent victims of greed and excess on Wall Street and as well as Washington, D.C. And they're angry, and they have every reason to be angry.
And they want this country to go in a new direction. And there are elements of my proposal that you just outlined which I won't repeat.
But we also have to have a short-term fix, in my view, and long- term fixes.
Let me just talk to you about one of the short-term fixes.
The catalyst for this housing crisis was the Fannie and Freddie Mae that caused subprime lending situation that now caused the housing market in America to collapse.
I am convinced that, until we reverse this continued decline in home ownership and put a floor under it, and so that people have not only the hope and belief they can stay in their homes and realize the American dream, but that value will come up.
Now, we have allocated $750 billion. Let's take 300 of that billion and go in and buy those home loan mortgages and negotiate with those people in their homes, 11 million homes or more, so that they can afford to pay the mortgage, stay in their home.
Now, I know the criticism of this.
Well, what about the citizen that stayed in their homes? That paid their mortgage payments? It doesn't help that person in their home if the next door neighbor's house is abandoned. And so we've got to reverse this. We ought to put the homeowners first. And I am disappointed that Secretary Paulson and others have not made that their first priority.
DID MCCAIN MENTION: A) A PLAN - as opposed to a single point in the plan -and B) WHY HIS WOULD BE BETTER THAN BARACK'S? (Thereby showing the world that he actually read Barack's plan)? Compare to Obama's response:
Schieffer: All right. Sen. Obama?
Obama: Well, first of all, I want to thank Hofstra University and the people of New York for hosting us tonight and it's wonderful to join Sen. McCain again, and thank you, Bob.
I think everybody understands at this point that we are experiencing the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. And the financial rescue plan that Sen. McCain and I supported is an important first step. And I pushed for some core principles: making sure that taxpayer can get their money back if they're putting money up. Making sure that CEOs are not enriching themselves through this process.
And I think that it's going to take some time to work itself out. But what we haven't yet seen is a rescue package for the middle class. Because the fundamentals of the economy were weak even before this latest crisis. So I've proposed four specific things that I think can help.
Number one, let's focus on jobs. I want to end the tax breaks for companies that are shipping jobs overseas and provide a tax credit for every company that's creating a job right here in America.
Number two, let's help families right away by providing them a tax cut -- a middle-class tax cut for people making less than $200,000, and let's allow them to access their IRA accounts without penalty if they're experiencing a crisis.
Now Sen. McCain and I agree with your idea that we've got to help homeowners. That's why we included in the financial package a proposal to get homeowners in a position where they can renegotiate their mortgages.
I disagree with Sen. McCain in how to do it, because the way Sen. McCain has designed his plan, it could be a giveaway to banks if we're buying full price for mortgages that now are worth a lot less. And we don't want to waste taxpayer money. And we've got to get the financial package working much quicker than it has been working.
Last point I want to make, though. We've got some long-term challenges in this economy that have to be dealt with. We've got to fix our energy policy that's giving our wealth away. We've got to fix our health care system and we've got to invest in our education system for every young person to be able to learn.
What a difference? Even though Barack didn't get to explain all four of his points, he tried to go through his points as quickly as possible, and he succeeded in mentioning how his plan stands in relation to McCain's plan. The transcript seems to show how crisp Barack's reply was when compared to McCain's response. This pattern is oft repeated in the transcript of the remainder of the debate. The rest of the transcript can be found at Cnn.com or nytimes.com. Keep up the good work for team Obama!
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