McCain busted by David Letterman, while plan is ready to be presented to Congress

McCain busted by David Letterman, while plan is ready to be presented to Congress

By: Bobbi Linn
Thursday, September 25, 2008, 1:58 PM

Members of a special committee announced moments ago that they have eached an agreement that will be presented to Congress for a vote. Members of boths sides of the aisle including the representative from Utah(R) and Senator Dodd(D) said that they all felt that the provisions made in the bill to bailout Wall Street had met the requirements to satisfy both Republicans and Democrats and would ensure that citizen tax payers would be protected by the tentative plan. They plan on presenting the bill shortly. The propsed bill includes limits on CEO pays, and issuing the money to Wall Street in waves, rather than all at once, to see where and how the money is spent and where it is needed. Congress members are hopeful that the bill will pass.  

Members of the committee said they planned to take a short recess while President Bush met with members of Congress, including Senator John McCain(R) and Barack Obama(D), both whom are scheduled to have their first presidential debate tomorrow evening.

McCain had made an announcement yesterday that he was not going to attend the debate despite calls from Congress members on both sides that his presence was not needed in order to finish negotiations, including a comment by Sen. Harry Reed who said today that John McCain would not have anthing to contribute to the process today and bringing his enterage here would hinder the progress they had made and politicize the bill that they had worked so hard on not politicizing.

The announcement made by John McCain has brought some scrutiny to his campaign. Recently, it was made public that someone ffrom his campaign accidentally released a talking points bulletin intended for his staff to the press on his backing away from ther debate. And McCain stressed a sense of urgancy in the crisis with his decision though he did not cancel his appearance at the Clinton Global Innitiative later that evening. He made statements that seemed to smack of his military background and place him in a heroe's position such as "all hands on deck". It seemed very inappropriate given the circumstances of where he was and the goal of the Clinton Global Initiative.

McCain said he planned to postpone his entire campaign, and then his campaign representatives went out on a media blitz saying this was classic McCain, putting country first.

McCain also cancelled an appearance on the David Letterman Show in New York City by contacting Letterman personally, saying he had to rush back to Washington right away to handle the crisis, prior to his appearance at the Clinton Global Initiative.  Letterman told McCain to go do what he had to do. Mr. Letterman, a late night talk show host, found a replacement for Senator McCain at the last minute for his show that day.  Keith Olberman of MSNBC was happy to fill in, as he has done several times at the request of Letterman.

McCain has been down as many as 9 points in public polls recently in his bid for the White House. There has been speculation that he made this announcement to try and drive voters under a false sense of leadership, trying to take credit for the proposed bill that he did not participate in for the last week during this crisis. And Letterman questioned why McCain did not send in his Vice Presidential running mate to fill in for him that day on the show, stating that is what the Vice President does, they fill in and step up top the plate when the President can not fullfill his duties.

Then an interesting development occured moments later. Letterman got word that John McCain had proceded to the CBS news room with Katie Couric in an unscheduled interview when he was supposed to be on the show with Letterman.

Letterman then began to ask questions and had his producers grab the live feed from the interview where we see McCain getting his makeup done sitting in front of Couric, preparing for an interview. A few minutes later we see McCain speaking to Couric, and Letterman is not happy.

Letterman repeatedly tells the national audience that "something stinks" and he then shouts at the live feed, though McCain can not hear him from the other room, "I have a question for you Senator McCain. Do you need a ride to the airport?!" Keith Olberman then breaks into hysterical laughter. Those of us who watched were left floored.

See the entire video here.

One has to wonder why Mccain would lie to Letterman, why he would be in such a rush to get to Washington and yet take time to make public appearances at both the CGI and the CBS Evening News in sharp contradiction to what he told the public and what he told Letterman.

This also contradicts his statement that he is postponing his campaigning. It seems to me that McCain is very clearly campaigning. He is trying to highjack the democratic process by not appearing at the national debate and using his startling annnouncement to bring media attention to his campaign in a ploy to sway voters his way. His staff is also running around politicizing this whole event, and all evidence points to campaign tactics.  His talking points bulletin that was leaked to the press only backup this theory, and this in no way looks good for McCain.

Members of both sides of Congress have said that McCain's presense would only distract them from the task at hand. So when will McCain come clean about why he wants to be there so badly? Does he honestly think that those of us who have watched the negotiations for the last week will think he rode in on his white horse and created this bill all by himself when he was not even part of the commmitee negotiating the bill? Give us a break. If this was so huge, why didn't he go to Washington a week ago when the rest of the world was told it was a crisis? Or last night? McCain looks like Bush in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. He's trying to save face a little too late.

Sorry, McCain, but you don't get a free pass on this one.