McCain Tries To Worm His Way Out Of Debating, Obama Rejects Petty Political Play

John McCain is seriously scared of what is going to happen on Friday. The first Presidential debate has been scheduled for months but just two days out McCain is trying to slither away. His excuse is that he wants to come to Washington to work on the economic crisis, but any astute observer of McCain can tell this is a petty political play. If McCain was serious about doing the business of the people in the Senate, he would have shown up for work more often in the last two years. Of course the GOP knows it as well, and they are all too happy to help him in getting away from having a debate in front of the American people.

From ThinkProgress:

Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) is announcing that he would like to suspend his campaign and delay Friday’s foreign policy debate to focus on the financial crisis. According to MSNBC, McCain would like to come back to Washington and help work out a bailout package on Thursday.

This interest in the bailout is new for McCain. As recently as yesterday, when a reporter asked him about his position on the Bush administration's financial proposals, McCain said, "I have not had a chance to see it in writing. I have to examine it." As the stock market tanked and the federal government bailed out financial institutions over the past week, McCain has been campaigning around the country. Originally, McCain McCain planned to skip the vote on the bailout and continue campaigning. The last time McCain voted in the Senate was on April 10.[...]

Fox reporter Carl Cameron lauded the "very, very big move" by McCain. Fox host Martha MacCallum hailed it as "a bold move, a very strong move." Cameron added that McCain is making "some political sacrifice" by volunteering to leave the campaign trail.

The White House also joined in to "laud" the Senator for coming to Washington to help bailout the companies that put us in this mess in the first place. The truth of the matter is, Americans do not trust McCain to handle the economic crisis and since Lehman's bankruptcy McCain has been steadily losing support. He is trying to boost his economic cred (even though admitting to not knowing much about economics) with a cheap political stunt, nothing more, nothing less.

The Obama camp had four words for McCain's trick, "The debate is on."