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McCain Ad Blasts Obama For Ties To Former Fannie Mae CEO Jim Johnson
The McCain campaign is continuing to hammer Barack Obama over his connections to Fannie Mae executives, which he laid out in his speech this morning, this time releasing a new national TV ad targeting former CEO Jim Johnson:
"Fannie cooked the books and Johnson made millions," the announcer says. "Then Obama asked him to pick his VP, and raise thousands for his campaign."
It's interesting that the second ad on the Fannie Mae issue goes after Jim Johnson, whose connections to Obama are much more substantial than they ever were for Franklin Raines, the target of the first ad. Then again, as we noted yesterday, Raines is black and Johnson is white.
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I dunno. This doesn't strike me as particularly effective.
September 19, 2008 10:01 AM | Reply | Permalink
I agree, not when you have a guy named Phil Gramm on your team.
September 19, 2008 10:03 AM | Reply | Permalink
Most people don't have a sense of how Fannie Mae is connected to the current crisis. If it does anything positive for McCain it would be to blunt Obama's attacks on his advisors.
September 19, 2008 10:04 AM | Reply | Permalink
Blunt Obama's attacks or invite Charles Keating into the picture?
September 19, 2008 12:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
That's cuz it didn't end with "I'm John McCain and I hate Mexicans."
September 19, 2008 10:24 AM | Reply | Permalink
LOL. Damn, I don't think I've ever seen you so frazzled. Dude, remember, you have to have that readiness and not blink. Stop blinking!!!!!
September 19, 2008 10:27 AM | Reply | Permalink
Not really frazzled...just amazed (though I don't know why it's so prevailent) at the duplicity here. You spend all week calling McCain a liar for misrepresenting Obama's positions in ads, and call out Republicans every day for using "code words" to stir up racial tensions, but faced with TheMessiahs patently false ad designed to soley stir up racial hatred in the Hispanic community and not a "blink" or a peep. I figured there'd be one honest poster among you...maybe not.
September 19, 2008 10:31 AM | Reply | Permalink
Shorter SFC Wallce: Please don't focus on the flailing old man and his incoherent economic message. Lipstick! Race Baiting of a Race Baiter!
When you call your fellow Republicans on those same tactic (and McCain and his camp have rolled out a litany of lies, including about Palin's record), then I'll join in your pity party. Until then, I suggest you go find a mirror and start practicing not blinking. You are not demonstrating that readiness!
September 19, 2008 10:38 AM | Reply | Permalink
I guess that's good enough...you've admitted to it...just won't call your guy out on it...it's a step in the right direction.
September 19, 2008 10:50 AM | Reply | Permalink
LOL. I'm really enjoying this. Usually military guys hold up better under pressure. You keep blinking. Every time you try to create some distraction, you blink. You are scared. You have a candidate who doesn't know shit about the economy and is joined at the hip with the architect of the current financial crisis and you running around trying to engage anyone who will listen about alleged race baiting of a notorious race baiter. Why won't anyone listen?!?!? Funny shit.
Keep practicing though, I think you've almost got that non blinking thing down.
September 19, 2008 10:59 AM | Reply | Permalink
So McCain is now the candidate for the WPP (White People's Party).
Good to know.
September 19, 2008 10:42 AM | Reply | Permalink
Bwahahahahahahahahahahahaha!
Republicans accusing Dems with being duplicitous?
Now That's Funny!
September 19, 2008 11:01 AM | Reply | Permalink
McCain capitulated big time to the immigrant hating wing of his party during the primaries when he said he would vote against his own bill. C-a-p-i-t-u-l-a-t-e-d.
He wants to run as a Maverick who is not responsible for anything his party does, even when he has consistently made concessions in his policy positions so that he could run as a republican he has to own. Obama insists on making him run as a republican who offers a repeat of Bush economic and foreign policies.
If he wanted to run as a partyless maverick who knows no party no ideology, no organizing principle other than his country first he should have had the courage to run under the Bull Moose Party. It would have made perfect sense given his claimed affinity for TR and his running mates identification with Mooses.
September 19, 2008 11:07 AM | Reply | Permalink
...we're not immigrant haters...we're anti-illegal immigration...which to you and your race baiting messiah = we hate Mexicans I guess...
September 19, 2008 11:41 AM | Reply | Permalink
McCain is not anti-Mexican. Arizona is close to Mexico, which is why he knows those Zapateros are revolutionary and not friendly hemishperians. It is the gooks McCain hates.
September 19, 2008 12:34 PM | Reply | Permalink
So your approach to convincing me that you don't hate someone is to insult me by saying I think Obama is the Messiah. Nice one.
(And I have news for you, according to my bible it says "thou shalt have any other gods before me"..and that includes that dude YOU call Lord, so shove it up your ass with the Messiah crap)
There are plenty of Republicans who are worried about illegal aliens only because they are not European. When I see the hue and cry about the Irish in Boston and the Poles in Chicago maybe I'll give a damn. And what is English as the official language garbage about if not a kind of cultural superiority complex in the face of all them mexicans.
Fact is McCain had a courageous stance but he gave it to the cretins, who are reviled in the Hispanic community.
What do you say about a man who is courageous enough to survive torture but who will only talk about his previous support for immigration reform when it's in a language he thinks his "base" won't understand. Let him live with his political cowardice.
September 19, 2008 1:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
The "Irish in Boston and the Poles in Chicago" came legaly and are as welcome as the legal immagrants from Mexico and anywhere else...it's illegal imigration I oppose. If it sounds like I'm repeating myself, it's because you're not listening.
September 19, 2008 2:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
I guess you haven't been to Boston or Chicago lately. There are tons of folks who come to work fresh off the boat. I'm not talking 1920's I am talking today. (Well probably far fewer Irish in the last decade or so since their economy was doing extremely well). The fact that you dismiss this so easily simply reinforces my point.
September 19, 2008 5:48 PM | Reply | Permalink
Isn't sad how the posters on this blog consistently refuse to show the proper deference and respect to McLame? I mean McSame. I'm sorry, I can't help it, I keep trying to type McCain.
September 19, 2008 10:48 AM | Reply | Permalink
ZZZZZZZZ... whah? Who? Somebody was saying something about money? Economy? Fundamentals?
What the hell are they talking about? Do regular Americans care about this stuff? Do regular Americans understand this stuff?
http://thepajamapundit.com/
September 19, 2008 10:28 AM | Reply | Permalink
PLEASE FORWARD!
IF you are interested in volunteering for O*bama/Biden in battle ground states; here is information to help you get a host family.
http://ObamaTravel.org/
REGISTER to vote - check to see if you are already registered to vote - VERIFY you voting address
www.voteforchange.com
EARLY & ABSENTEE VOTING Information; Please forward this link.
http://www.earlyvoting.net/states/abslaws.php
September 19, 2008 11:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
PLEASE FORWARD!
IF you are interested in volunteering for O*bama/Biden in battle ground states; here is information to help you get a host family.
http://ObamaTravel.org/
REGISTER to vote - check to see if you are already registered to vote - VERIFY you voting address
www.voteforchange.com
EARLY & ABSENTEE VOTING Information; Please forward this link.
http://www.earlyvoting.net/states/abslaws.php
September 19, 2008 11:35 AM | Reply | Permalink
They screw it up yesterday, so they decided to try again... They once again fail!
McCain-Palin'08: Fundamentally wrong!
September 19, 2008 10:02 AM | Reply | Permalink
They just do get it - in a fundamental kind of way.
September 19, 2008 10:05 AM | Reply | Permalink
Well that was lame. Folks care jobs and how you are going to solve the economic woes we all wll face in the comming months. This ad is wasted on them. They want reassurance and plans thus far all Mccain has provided is yawn inducing attacks that are hard to define and resonnate with anyone let alone low info voters.
September 19, 2008 10:07 AM | Reply | Permalink
"A new national TV ad" to be played only on political blogs and cable news shows, no doubt.
September 19, 2008 10:09 AM | Reply | Permalink
Can someone explain how "inner circle" Jim Johnson is? Or is this another game of "GUILT BY ASSOCIATION!"
WEEEEEEEEEEEE
September 19, 2008 10:10 AM | Reply | Permalink
He was one of the major vetters of Obama's VP candidates until his notoriety caused enough distraction that he withdrew from the process.
As a vetter he obviously acted recklessly and with pure political calculation in helping Obama reach the conclusion that Joe Biden is somehow qualified to be a heart beat way from the presidency. Scandalous.
September 19, 2008 11:15 AM | Reply | Permalink
So basically the McCain camp wiffed on the fire chairman cox gambit and is desperately moving on to another talking point. It's time for these guys to call it a week and start fresh on Monday. What a hilariously inept few days.
Pufferfish
September 19, 2008 10:12 AM | Reply | Permalink
McCain needs his weekend off to catch some Zzzzzs and recharge. Otherwise he might start to get a little cranky.
September 19, 2008 10:14 AM | Reply | Permalink
You know, Danny, it's probably true that no SEC Chairman could survive a President asking him to step down. They're not Supreme Court justices. If one turns out to be inept or dirty, a President can get rid of him on a moment's notice. And, whether he's dirty or not, you don't really think an SEC Chairman could stand up to the Republican smear machine, do you?
September 19, 2008 10:48 AM | Reply | Permalink
Whether he *could* be removed by pressure seems beside the point. Although one should ask if disrespecting the supposed independence of independent agencies is a problem in and of itself.
Serious people know that short selling is not the problem here, nor is it Cox's fault, per se. It is much deeper and wider: It is the philosophy of antipathy to regulation of markets in an increasingly opaque and complex world that is at fault and in that McCain is complicit.
Billy was right to point out several weeks ago, McCain as essentially a crusader. He has problem identifying his own philosophy even when it is apparent in his record. Today Cox is wearing a red tie, so McCain charges.
Management by episodic indignation is a very poor substitute for management by forward thinking planning.
September 19, 2008 11:24 AM | Reply | Permalink
P-H-I-L- -G-R-A-M-M.
September 19, 2008 10:17 AM | Reply | Permalink
When you spell it out it makes me think he was a Pilgrim.
September 19, 2008 10:53 AM | Reply | Permalink
It's funny watching McCain try to morph into an anti-lobbyist reformer. I wonder if Rick Davis, Charlie Black and the rest of the gang are as tickled as I am.
September 19, 2008 10:18 AM | Reply | Permalink
McCain has so desperately been trying to morph and co-op so many of Obama's ideas and policy positions lately that I'm half expecting him to show up for his next press conference in blackface.
September 21, 2008 8:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
Do they REALLLLYYY want to go there?
September 19, 2008 10:19 AM | Reply | Permalink
CNN is reporting a new McCain initiative (See below, and http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/09/19/campaign.wrap/index.html). Irony alert -- the proposal to set up a new agency is clearly modeled on the Resolution Trust Corp. set up to deal with the Savings & Loan crises. And of course, McCain, although unindicted, was implicated in the Keating 5 scandal which precipitated the S&L crises. So here is one area of economics where McCain really does have some experience.
(CNN) -- Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain said Friday morning he would establish a new agency to deal with the U.S. financial crisis that many experts say is the worst since the Great Depression.
Sen. John McCain Friday blamed corruption and greed for the current financial crisis.
1 of 2 That agency, a mortgage and financial institutions trust, would work with the private sector and regulators to identify institutions that are weak and fix them before they go broke.
"The underlying principle of the MFI or any approach considered by Congress should be to keep people in their homes and safeguard the life savings of all Americans by protecting our financial system and capital markets," McCain told the Green Bay Chamber of Commerce in Wisconsin.
McCain said the agency would be an early intervention program to help financial institutions avoid bankruptcy, expensive bailouts and damage to their customers.
September 19, 2008 10:23 AM | Reply | Permalink
by the way Johnson stepped down 2 MONTHS before Biden was chosen.....another lie but that is the old farts pattern
September 19, 2008 10:23 AM | Reply | Permalink
This is an innoculation ad. Obama has been hitting hard at the top seven McCain advisors. The current ads will be used to establish a moral equivalency. Yes, both sides have lobbyists or former financial executives. So What?
Obama waited far too long and hit far too weakly. It is not that there are seven lobbyists, there are 116 lobbyists. There are few who are not lobbyists on
his staff.
September 19, 2008 10:25 AM | Reply | Permalink
This is more McCain mendacity. Jim Johnson and Franklin Raines have been gone from Fannie Mae for years. Daniel Mudd, the disgraced Fannie Mae CEO who is most implicated in this mess just had to step down, is a supporter of John McCain. Google it.
Another fun fact is that MSNBC's David Gregory's wife is the General Counsel of Fannie Mae. Hope we don't see David Gregory weighing in on this!
September 19, 2008 10:27 AM | Reply | Permalink
They know they had NO leg to stand on using Raines so they hit with Jim Johnson but this is also WEAK but at least it isn't racist.
September 19, 2008 10:29 AM | Reply | Permalink
So let me get this straight, the federal government is exploring setting up a kind of Resolution Trust Company to deal with all "waste and corruption on Wall" (to paraphrase McPhalin) and take on shaky assets. It seemed to work back in the late '80s to deal with the S&L crisis which involved. . .oh, oh: KEATING FIVE
September 19, 2008 10:29 AM | Reply | Permalink
What's all this Keating kerfuffle? You Dem's just keep focusing on the number two person on the ticket. Palin was smoking marijuana when McCain was covering Keating's backside. She had nothing to do with it.
September 19, 2008 12:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
The thing about these ads is that they're defensive responses. As long as Obama is on offense and McCain is playing defense, it's good.
September 19, 2008 10:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
Everything McCain says is now discounted by nearly everyone because he destroyed his credibility by lying over and over again.
The living symbol of his mendacity is Palin. She introduced him this morning and that let us imagine what she would do in the midst of an economic free-fall.
Remember what she said in response to Biden; paying taxes is not a patriotic duty. Somebody needs to ask her and the potential First Dude; is it your patriotic duty to NOT pay taxes? Where are your tax returns? If Obama wins do you advocate a tax revolt?
September 19, 2008 10:34 AM | Reply | Permalink
Nice to know Palin is stepping out and showing her leadership capabilities in this time of crisis. Has she said anything that could confuse her with a leader? How the hell is the #2 person in line not saying anything on her own that makes America believe she is not a total windbag?
September 19, 2008 11:00 AM | Reply | Permalink
The ads go back and forth creating confusion but, in the end, the candidate of the incumbent party will get most of the blame from the electorate and will lose the election.
Obama's team knows this. That's why they are so calm, sticking to the key issues, and not taking the bait on distractions like Palin.
McCain's team knows this. That's why they are pursuing a "hail mary" strategy with the Palin selection, and trying to bait Obama into an overreation with their unprecedented pathological lying. It's why they are intentionally antagonizing the press, in hopes of generating a popular backlash in their favor. None of these moves is likely to work, but their alternative is to conceded defeat, so they take the long shot. Both McCain and Palin's reputations are likely to be destroyed as a result, but McCain is too ambitious to give up on his last shot at the Presidency just yet, and Palin is too naive about politics outside Alaska to realize what this will do to her.
September 19, 2008 10:34 AM | Reply | Permalink
The gloves are really off now. That ad is nothing. The speech is the real high inside fastball. The remark about Obama "gaming" the system is big time double entendre. The McCain campaign has the high ground on Fannie Mae and the financial crisis, and they are going to beat Obama up with it for a while.
September 19, 2008 10:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
How do they have the "high ground"?
September 19, 2008 10:45 AM | Reply | Permalink
You'd have to inhabit the Billy Glad Alternate Universe to make any sense of that. (Be thankful you don't, though.)
September 19, 2008 10:47 AM | Reply | Permalink
Oh, is he one of those?
I wasn't aware...
September 19, 2008 10:49 AM | Reply | Permalink
How do you draw that conclusion? Fannie and Freddie's problems under Raines and Johnson had little to do with the underlying problem that necessitated the government bailout. Any time you have $6 Trillion in loans with inadequate bad debt reserves AND a lack of liquidity in the secondary markets (Fannie and Freddie are the secondary market at this point), the government had to step in to make their implicit guarantee EXPLICIT.
This has nothing to do with Raines or Johnson. But again, I'm interested in how you draw your conclusion.
September 19, 2008 10:47 AM | Reply | Permalink
He has his little Senate speech, "predicting" the present disaster two years ago. The right is already portraying him as the voice crying in the wilderness, the prophet squelched by the Democratic Congress with the help of a few turncoat Republicans. Then Obama brings the Fannie May "crooks" into his campaign. It's a perfect situation for someone running against Washington as a "reformer." Read this morning's speech. McCain's speech writer lays it out pretty well. Rove is hammering the same points in the right wing media. Please don't confuse "high ground" in a tactical sense with "high ground" in a moral sense. Sorry for the confusion.
September 19, 2008 10:54 AM | Reply | Permalink
I didn't misinterpret how you meant "high ground." I just don't agree with the assessment. McCain is and has been on defense all week. They're throwing whatever they can think of at him to hopefully stem Obama's momentum. I don't think these Raines and Johnson ads are remotely enough.
September 19, 2008 11:00 AM | Reply | Permalink
It's the content of the speech that's interesting, not the ad.
September 19, 2008 11:02 AM | Reply | Permalink
Right. Sorry. You did say that.
I still don't agree. Since he again falsely claims that Johnson was an Obama advisor, it does play nicely into the "McCain lies again" narrative.
I guess we'll just have to wait and see if it gets any traction. I'd be surprised if it does.
September 19, 2008 11:07 AM | Reply | Permalink
Well, right now, both campaigns, but particularly McCain's, seem to be putting their faith in the adage that "you can never go wrong by underestimating the intelligence of the American public." As you say, we'll know soon enough if the McCain theme gets traction.
September 19, 2008 11:11 AM | Reply | Permalink
I don't know about that. Obama's 2-minute ad was hardly playing to the low-info.
September 19, 2008 11:15 AM | Reply | Permalink
OK... A few things factually wrong and deceptive about this ad.
1) NewsClip: "Fannie Mae Lobbies To Protect Tax Break" 1.16.95
I thought Republicans were for tax breaks. If this is something bad, Isn't this a contradiction to their current tax for business plan?
2) NewsClip: "High Pay at Fannie Mae For Well Connected" 12.23.04 shown with picture of Jim Johnson.
Jim Johnson was Vice Chairman at Fannie Mae from 1990-1991 and CEO from 1991-1998.
The problems with Fannie Mae happened in this decade under different leadership...
The voice-over states that Fannie Mae "cooked the books" and "Johnson made millions" implying Johnson had something to do with the problems at Fannie Mae in this decade... which could not be more false.
September 19, 2008 10:46 AM | Reply | Permalink
Both these ads are such a non issue, seriously.
September 19, 2008 10:54 AM | Reply | Permalink
Fannie and Freddie are NOT the reason why Wallstreet is falling a part.
It is DEREGULATION that is the reason why it's bad.
Also, Obama has no real association with Fannie & Freddie. Jim Johnson was on the VP list for like 3 days and Raines NEVER adviced Obama and there is he has an email to prove it in which he sent to Carla Fiorina.
These guilt by association ads are just dumb.
It's time to bring out KEATING FIVE!
September 19, 2008 10:58 AM | Reply | Permalink
Let's be clearer. F&F are mostly victims of the burst bubble in real estate and the Treasury and Fed's intervention was to provide liquidity in a situation where F&F not being able to play it's role would hurt many many "innocent" homeowners and investors. Malfeasance by F&F is a total red herring. Having a secondary market in mortgages, and guaranteeing loans is a good thing.
The real issue is whether by growing so large (and without adequate supervision, i.e. adequate reserve requirements) F&F exposed the Federal govt and the taxpayers to risks that the political system does not want to honor or bear. That is a far cry from saying they created the mess. Of course, McCain is happy to have you believe that.
McCain seems to be playing this like the victims are the taxpayers; when the danger is actually to our whole system of finance that underpins the
economy. It's like saying the real victims of 9-11 were the insurance companies. His impulse to revert to ideological talking points is a bad sign.
September 19, 2008 1:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yawn.
When it takes more than one soundbite to make the wingnut case, nobody except the political junkies listen.
September 19, 2008 11:11 AM | Reply | Permalink
Jim Johnson left Fannie Mae in 1998, I believe...
September 19, 2008 11:45 AM | Reply | Permalink
ouch!!
September 19, 2008 12:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
He wasn't an Obama economic advisor so I'm not sure what the big deal is here.
Unless, more likely, it is just another case of throwing everything and seeing what sticks.
September 19, 2008 12:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
For five years John McCain did not have a home mortgage packaged by Fannie Mae.
September 19, 2008 12:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
Cookin the books? Republicans have cooked more books in the last 8 years than ever...the biggest one being Iraq. When it's their own money that's on the line,....now they want big government regulation and bail out. What do Republicans stand for again? Is it it Big Government, big spending, high deficits, endless wars, financial illiteracy....they sounds like drunk gamblers to me.
September 19, 2008 12:45 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well, if anyone would know from cooking the books, it would be John "Keating 5" McCain.
September 19, 2008 3:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
We have to start ASAP ads showing the Keating 5.
If this gold digger, cheap dipper,shameless clown is going to say just about any lie to confuse and distort Barak records
September 20, 2008 12:29 AM | Reply | Permalink
Wanna see corruption?, check out Daytona Beach, a city that has earned the "Most Corrupt" awards in every category. Daytona Beach has been besieged by rampant corruption as a result of the undue influence of a handful of local tycoons, considered above the law. The malfeasance has reached untenable levels and we need urgent Federal intervention.
http://www.DaytonaPost.com
It's not just the crime on the streets and the lack of jobs and business opportunities, but the general lack of morale in the population. A population that has given up all hope. While the homeless roam the streets and the able flee the city, what's left is but a shadow of what could have been a great Florida city.
September 21, 2008 5:45 PM | Reply | Permalink