WILL MCCAIN PIN THE TAIL ON THE DONKEY?

"My friends, we've got them just where we want them," Sen. John McCain said in a revamped stump speech Monday (10/13).

Since Sen. Barack Hussein Obama has leads ranging from 4 to 11 percentage points in the major polls, few conservative pundits share Sen. McCain's optimism. Given the severity of the financial crisis, it's doubtful a Republican ticket headed by Abraham Lincoln or Ronald Reagan could prevail this November.  

That most in the news media have abandoned all pretense of objectivity compounds Sen. McCain's problems. Stories unflattering to Sen. McCain and his running mate are hyped, while stories unflattering to Sen. Obama are ignored.

For instance, most of us heard over the weekend that an investigator for the Alaska legislature concluded that though Gov. Sarah Palin had the right to fire police commissioner Walter Monegan, her motives were impure.

How many of you have heard that Illinois' attorney general is investigating a $100,000 grant then state Sen. Barack Hussein Obama steered to a campaign volunteer for a botanic garden that was never built?  

Or that the FBI last week raided the offices of Larry Walsh, Will County Illinois executive, a poker playing buddy of Barack Hussein Obama when both served in the Illinois legislature, and to whom U.S. Sen. Obama steered several millions of dollars of federal earmark spending?  

You probably would have if Sen. Obama were a Republican.

Add in Sen. Obama's huge fund raising advantage and his strong performance in the first two presidential debates, the amazing thing is  Sen. McCain still has a chance to win.

That chance will evaporate if economic turmoil continues.  But if the stock and credit markets stabilize and panic subsides, Sen. McCain still could prevail — but only if he elevates his game in the final debate tomorrow (10/15).

At the heart of the financial crisis were the reckless lending and corrupt accounting practices of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the two "government-sponsored enterprises" which at one time controlled 90 percent of the secondary mortgage market.  

In 2005, Sen. McCain was one of four GOP senators to propose stiffer regulatory oversight of Fannie and Freddie which, if enacted, might have prevented the meltdown.  But Democrats blocked it.

Sen. Obama did nothing to create this crisis.  But associates did.  They include two former Fannie Mae CEO's; a former Fannie Mae vice chairman who is thought to be on the short list for Attorney General, and the chairman of his finance committee, who pioneered the suspect packaging of subprime mortgages at her now defunct Superior bank in Chicago.

The radical group ACORN, better known for its fraudulent voter registration activities, pushed hard for the risky loans that have torpedoed the economy.  Sen. Obama worked with ACORN when he was a community organizer, served for a time as its lawyer in Chicago, and steered money to it when he served on the board of the Woods Foundation and as chairman of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge.

Sen. Obama has blamed the crisis on a Republican-sponsored bill in 1999 which erased a bright line between investment and commercial banks.  Robert Rubin, President Clinton's first Treasury secretary, said that bill "had no impact, zero" on the subprime crisis.  

President Clinton supported the measure, as did most House and Senate Democrats, including Sen. Joe Biden.  Yet when Sen. Obama repeated this canard in the first two presidential debates, Sen. McCain let it pass without comment.

Sen. McCain also has yet to challenge Sen. Obama to his face about his associations with unrepentant domestic terrorist William Ayers, corrupt financier Tony Rezko, racist preacher Jeremiah Wright, ACORN, and others.

Sen. Obama is not guilty of crimes his associates may have committed.  But that he  chose to associate with them says much about his judgment and worldview.  Sen. McCain can still win this election — but only if he pins the tail on the donkey.

Jack Kelly is a former Marine and Green Beret and a former deputy assistant secretary of the Air Force in the Reagan administration. He is national security writer for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.