How to Manage the Financial Sector Meltdown

Both Obama and McCan't have a formidable job ahead of them depending on who gets elected (I'll give you one guess as to who that will be). Marc Ambinder writes that they will have to tread very carefully during the campaign around this issue. He acknowledges why it'll be so tough to deal with:

[M]ost voters and even many political analysts ... don't really understand precisely what's happening and precisely when and how the dominos will topple in a way that we can percieve the consequences.

True statement. But I don't think it's really that important for voters to understand how toppling financial sector companies affect our everyday lives. Obama can turn this into an opportunity to lead and inform at the same time. He can talk about the perfect storm of circumstances -- from lost jobs to badly structured loans to rampant speculation to corporate greed -- led to simultaneous collapses in the housing, mortgage, and investment banking sectors. The consumer; the local, state and federal and international governments; and the global banking and investment banking worlds, are increasingly interdependent entities. When one entity collapses, the rest fall.

It can be kept simple enough to drive home the point that all of this happened under Bush's watch due to a near-criminal atmosphere of deregulation. The supply-siders who argue that letting the market correct itself don't understand that way too much damage can be done in the process that affects not only the country's economy, but the world's. Regulation, even minimal types of controls, can be helpful when they are followed.

If he manages to do or say anything honestly at this point (highly unlikely), all McCan't can do is to admit that the president he supported 90% of the time is a member of his political party, and that the GOP cannot continue on the same path if it is to bring stability back to the national economy.