One of major stinkers in the banking crisis? Former Senator Phil Gramm - a major jackass and UBS lackey who helped put in place the deregulated environment that led to the current financial mess this country is in. What's he doing now? Why, he's John McCain's campaign chairman and chief economic advisor!

Tim - Thank you for the link. Amazing. Seems like McCain is working hard to live down to GWB's level....

Is John McCain a loose canon?

I haven't verified any of these claims, but they all merit looking into.

[McCain seems distinctly uninterested when asked questions concerning abortion and gay rights. While campaigning in South Carolina, he told reporters riding with him on his bus that he was comfortable pledging to appoint judges who would strictly interpret the Constitution in part because it would reassure conservatives who might otherwise distrust him.

"It's not social issues I care about," he explained.]( http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/02/AR2008020202074_2.html)

Another">http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/02/AR2008020202074_2.html">Another reason John McCain will be the next president of the U.s.

More than in most previous primaries, Republican voters seem focused less on ideological purity than on a desire to beat the Democratic nominee in the fall. Their year-long dalliance with Giuliani proves that there are many Republicans who are at least willing to put aside hot-button issues such as abortion. The candidates most associated with conservative issues -- such as Rep. Tom Tancredo (Colo.), who made illegal immigration his cause -- hardly registered in the race.

The ideology of Democrats will be their downfall.

The practicality of Republicans will secure them the nomination.

JoAnn, The "practicality" of the GOP is overstated, to say the least. From your linked source:

"You need to have a Republican who can appeal to the majority of the country," McCain strategist Charlie Black said.

So what's the matter with this statement? Well, nothing except that it is made by another McCain campaign asshole, Charlie Black:

The founder and current head of BKSH is Charlie Black, whose ties with the Bush family go back to 1972, when he and Karl Rove were jockeying for control of the College Republicans in a campaign so dirty that George H.W. Bush, then head of the Republican National Committee, had to step in and sort matters out. Black then worked for Ronald Reagan's and George H.W. Bush's presidential campaigns from 1976 to 1992. He served as an adviser to George W. Bush's campaigns in 2000 and 2004 and is often quoted in news stories as an unofficial White House spokesman.

BKSH was representing Iraq exile Ahmed Chalabi as early as 1999 and continued doing so until the invasion of Iraq. An international con-man found guilty in absentia in Jordan for bank scams, Chalabi is most widely known for being one of the key pre-Iraq war intelligence propagandists who supplied skewed information to support the Pentagon's ultra-secretive Office of Special Plans and the now-discredited pre-war reporting of Judith Miller for the New York Times. During 2004, Francis Brooke of the Rendon Group, which had represented Chalabi since the early 90's, was working on contract in Baghdad for BKSH. Then in the summer and fall of 2005, Lincoln Group, which had been tasked by the Pentagon with providing pro-US stories to Iraqi media, was subcontracting the work to BKSH, as the same time as BKSH was registered to represent the government of Iraq as its US lobbyist.

McCain has also hired a torture apologist, Michael Goldfarb, to be his deputy communications director. Goldfarb transferred from the center of neoconservative horseshit, the Weekly Standard. (So much for McCain's principled opposition to torture.)

McCain has a whole pack of Bush thugs working for him, with fingerprints smeared all over the subprime mortgage mess, the phony Iraq intelligence program, "enhanced interrogation", and more. Obama should run a series of adds describing every one of these scumbags and their "accomplishments". Candidates can say whatever they like during campaigns, but Bush showed us that one might be better served by paying attention to the bastards they surround themselves with. Anyone remember that George Bush wasn't interested in nation building?

When I heard the report that more money was lost be European banks than US banks as a result of this fiasco, I was extremely embarrassed. Just because we can sell things, doesn't make it right when someone buys it. There is a certain thing called ethics. "Buyer beware" doesn't allow the sale of anything.

Dodd for Secretary of Commerce!

Tim and Joann, you're links are especially marvelous today.

Is John McCain a loose canon?

I think these claims are plausible, as they are repeated by a number of close McCain associates. Obama should exploit this in the debates, remaining calm and dignified while trying indirectly to get him to snap.

They all knew it was going to happen and protected their banking buddies way back in 2004 with the Bankrupcy Bill:

"This bill was designed to point a thousand daggers squarely at consumers in trouble." http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news04/2005/bankruptcy_act01.html

Wish the news media would do it's job and inform all Americans that they'd been sold out by their elected reps on both sides of the aisle.