San Diego Union-Tribune columnist Ruben Navarrette is once again attempting to carry Sen. John McCain's water, by creating the allusion that McCain's publicity stunt, suspending his presidential campaign, skipping the debate in Oxford Mississippi on 9/26/08, is some sort of symbol of "leadership."

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/09/26/navarrette.obama.mccain/index.html?imw=Y&iref=mpstoryemail

David Blaine, the magician/illusionist is currently pulling off another one of his stunts in Central Park, New York. Sen. John McCain is apparently smitten by this and has attempted to pull off a stunt of his own. While Blaine obviously does his stunts for financial rewards, McCain attempted to reverse his slump in the polls with a "riverboat" gamble, which thus far has failed.
Sen. McCain must have thought that Republican lawmakers would rally around his attempted cause celebrity by giving him a political victory in agreeing to his (McCain's) terms of a bailout agreement. The entire issue surrounding the collapse of the markets has propelled Sen. Barack Obama's poll numbers to above 50% for the first time in the Presidential campaign period thus far.

Obviously McCain does not want to face the issues of bailouts to firms which would include the revelation that members of McCain's campaign staff continue to receive monthly checks from the very institutions at the heart of the economic crisis at hand.

It also does not help that Gov. Sarah Palin is stumbling through her discourse with the media. It's becoming more evident that she is in way over her head.

Navarrette once again is injecting race into his pro McCain columns by calling the McCain stance a "Mexican Standoff." That might play well in California, but it won't fly in Washington Heights, or the Bronx, New York. The more Navarrette advocates McCain's position, the more he resembles Armstrong Williams' role as the 2008 version thereof. In 2004 Williams was accused of receiving payoffs from the GOP for advocating the GOP cause.

Corruption on Wall Street should not be bridged with corruption in broadcast journalism. But I digress. Why Navarrette takes the position that the economic crisis is "media hysteria" is the worst attempt of spin in recent times. A clear sign that the media cronies of McCain are feeling desperate about the current state of McCain's electoral position heading into the debate season. Republicans don't seem to share this position. Quite frankly it's contradictory to claim that McCain is taking a correct stance to inject himself into the current finacial crisis, and then claim there is no crisis by categorizing the situation as "media hysteria."

McCain, and House Republicans, are actually making President George Bush look more the "maverick" than McCain.

Apparently McCain's involvement has only hindered the process.

Thus Obama's claim that a President has to be able to, "mutli-task," gives Obama more credibility.

Bottom line, Obama got it right, McCain and Navarrette each got it wrong.