2008 Recession

NYTimes: The Reckoning: Agency’s ’04 Rule Let Banks Pile Up New Debt

In his recent remarks in St. Clair Shores, Michigan, Biden said, "John McCain has confessed, and I quote -- I want to make sure I get it right -- he said, 'It's easy for me to be in Washington and frankly be somewhat divorced from the day-to-day challenges people have.'

"Well, he's right. He's right. If all you do is walk the halls of power, all you'll hear is the wants of the powerful. Ladies and gentleman, I believe that's why John McCain could say with a straight face as recently as this morning, and this is a quote, 'the fundamentals of the economy are strong.' That's what John said. He says that we've made 'great progress economically' in the Bush years.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I could walk from here to Lansing, and I wouldn't run into a single person who thought our economy was doing well -- unless I ran into John McCain."

He added, "What is John's response to the state of the economy? Let me quote him: 'A lot of this is psychological.' Let me tell you something: losing your job is more than a state of mind. It means staring at the ceiling at night thinking that you may lose your house because you can't get next month's mortgage payment.

"It means looking at your pregnant wife and not knowing how you're going to come up with the money to pay for the delivery of your child, since you don't have health care anymore. It means looking at your child when they come home from college at Christmas and saying 'Honey, I'm sorry, we're not going to be able to send you back next semester.' It's not a state of mind; it's a loss of dignity."

Obama's "Fundamentals" ad highlights how disturbingly out of touch John McCain is with what's going in the lives of ordinary Americans. On a day when Wall Street was in crisis John McCain continued to insist that the "fundamentals of the economy are strong."

The I-35W Mississippi River bridge catastrophically failed during the evening rush hour on August 1, 2007, collapsing to the river and riverbanks beneath. Thirteen people were killed and approximately one hundred more were injured. The average age of American bridges is 43 years, approaching the normal lifespan of 50 years. One fourth have a problem.