Everett, Wash.
Published: Wednesday, October 8, 2008

Candidates' debate focuses on pocketbooks

The Washington Post

 NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- On a day in which the stock market took another sharp plunge, presidential candidates Sens. John McCain and Barack Obama clashed repeatedly Tuesday night over the causes of the economic meltdown that has shaken the country and offered sharply contrasting prescriptions for how to restore stability.

McCain played the role of the aggressor throughout the 90-minute debate, accusing his Democratic rival of favoring major tax and spending increases and of relying too often on big government programs to reshape the nation's health-care system. He said he would do more to shake up Washington and bring cooperation to the capital.

"I have a clear record of bipartisanship," he said. "The situation today cries out for bipartisanship. Senator Obama has never taken on his leaders of his party on a single issue."

Obama countered by accusing the Republican of favoring Bush administration policies that he said had helped put the economy in dire straits. Those policies, he charged, called for less regulation and were based on the belief that by letting markets run wild, "prosperity would rain down on all of us. It hasn't worked out that way. And so now we've got to take some decisive action."

McCain's mortgage plan

McCain used the debate to promote another approach to solving the economic crisis, saying he would have the government buy up bad mortgages and renegotiate them at the current lower housing values, thereby allowing struggling homeowners to remain in their homes. He argued that until the housing markets stabilize, the economy will continue to falter, and he sought to use the idea to demonstrate his independence from the Bush administration.

"It's my proposal, it's not Senator Obama's proposal, it's not President Bush's proposal," he said. "But I know how to get America working again, restore our economy and take care of working Americans."

The plan, he said, would turn such mortgages over to the government, replacing them with "manageable, fixed-rate mortgages" for homeowners to reduce the chances of default. But McCain did not fully explain how he would finance the program, other than to say that it could dip into the money recently passed in the $700 billion economic rescue package.

Nor did he explain how it would square with his promise to freeze all government spending. McCain seemed to be proposing two opposing ideas at once: paring back on the budget, through cutting defense programs and earmarks, while at the same time adding an expensive program.

The Obama campaign called the mortgage idea "old news," saying that a similar Treasury Department program is already under way as part of the economic rescue package and that Obama backed it.

Foreign policies

Although economic issues dominated much of the debate, some of the most pointed exchanges were over foreign policy. McCain charged that Obama had been wrong on the surge of U.S. troops in Iraq and accused his rival of "talking loudly" by threatening to attack Pakistan. Obama accused McCain of getting his facts wrong and said it was McCain whose rhetoric was belligerent.

"This is the guy who sang bomb, bomb, bomb Iran, who called for the annihilation of North Korea," Obama said. "That I don't think is an example of 'speaking softly.' This is the person who, after we had -- we hadn't even finished Afghanistan, where he said, 'Next up, Baghdad.'"

McCain laid out his differences with Obama largely on policy grounds, and repeatedly questioned whether his rival has the judgment and experience to run the country.

Foreign policy occupied the last third of the debate, with the candidates clashing repeatedly on Pakistan and on their overall approaches to the use of U.S. military forces. McCain sharply criticized Obama's opposition to the troop surge in Iraq and his response to Russian aggression in Georgia, as he sought to sow doubts about his challenger's capacity to handle the commander-in-chief functions.

National security

"In his short career, he does not understand our national security challenges," McCain said. "We don't have time for on-the-job training."

Obama bristled at the statement and McCain's suggestion, as he put it, that "I don't understand" elements of foreign policy. The Democrat used his response to re-frame his critique of the Iraq war as a diversion from vital U.S. security interests.

"It's true; there are some things I don't understand," Obama said sarcastically. "I don't understand how we ended up invading a country that had nothing to do with 9/11 while Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida are setting up base camps and safe havens to train terrorists to attack us. That was Senator McCain's judgment, and it was the wrong judgment."
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