Senator John McCain thinks that the economy is fundamentally sound and that we should keep dropping taxes for the rich while wasting ten billion dollars a month (and lives) in Iraq. Obviously this has not been working as evidenced by our mounting national and personal debt. Today we are starting to see the beginning of the blowback for these conservative policies with large and storied financial institutions falling like a house of cards. Unlike McCain who is advocating for more of the same, Barack Obama has exactly the right message:
This morning we woke up to some very serious and troubling news from Wall Street.
The situation with Lehman Brothers and other financial institutions is the latest in a wave of crises that are generating enormous uncertainty about the future of our financial markets. This turmoil is a major threat to our economy and its ability to create good-paying jobs and help working Americans pay their bills, save for their future, and make their mortgage payments.
The challenges facing our financial system today are more evidence that too many folks in Washington and on Wall Street weren’t minding the store. Eight years of policies that have shredded consumer protections, loosened oversight and regulation, and encouraged outsized bonuses to CEOs while ignoring middle-class Americans have brought us to the most serious financial crisis since the Great Depression.
I certainly don’t fault Senator McCain for these problems, but I do fault the economic philosophy he subscribes to. It’s a philosophy we’ve had for the last eight years – one that says we should give more and more to those with the most and hope that prosperity trickles down to everyone else. It’s a philosophy that says even common-sense regulations are unnecessary and unwise, and one that says we should just stick our heads in the sand and ignore economic problems until they spiral into crises.
Well now, instead of prosperity trickling down, the pain has trickled up – from the struggles of hardworking Americans on Main Street to the largest firms of Wall Street.
This country can’t afford another four years of this failed philosophy. For years, I have consistently called for modernizing the rules of the road to suit a 21st century market – rules that would protect American investors and consumers. And I’ve called for policies that grow our economy and our middle-class together. That is the change I am calling for in this campaign, and that is the change I will bring as President.
Change isn't just an empty slogan for politicians to throw around while their policies are meant to keep the status quo going. McCain can say the word "change" all he wants but his actions show he wants the rich to get richer at the expense of the poor. Barack Obama wants to take us in a different direction than the one we've been heading in for the last eight years, so for the next fifty days we must work to get him in the White House in order to start the ball rolling.
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