The Note: Savings and Bailouts

Sept. 19, 2008— -- Six lessons of a tumultuous week in the presidential race:

1. The distance between John McCain's short list and John McCain's pink-slip list is sometimes short (and his desires may not have any relationship to actual presidential power).

2. The distance between Joe Biden's brain and Joe Biden's mouth is also sometimes short.

3. It's always going to be about Bill Clinton, to some degree, stupid.

4. Palin power has its limits.

5. Pig futures and cosmetic prices don't qualify as economic issues.

6. Neither John McCain nor Barack Obama got where he is because of the economy, but neither will either man get where he needs to go without it.

There is exactly one issue that matters right now (which means only one way to make news before the first debate).

And on that issue, the candidates may be only minor players. Staying out of everyone's way is the smart play at this moment -- and that's Obama's policy as of Friday morning -- and will soon be McCain's, too.

Perhaps the most consequential political fallout of this week that brought us a new overriding subject (in a campaign that was desperate for one) is the way in which the candidates' running room has narrowed.

Outside events -- including fresh actions Friday from a we're-still-here Bush administration and a we're not-going-home-yet Congress -- are reshaping the political field.

"Already, even before it is fully played out, the crisis means the next president -- that would be President Obama or President McCain -- will enter office with handcuffs on," Gerald Seib writes in his Wall Street Journal column. "Options are being reduced for the next president every day, as the real and psychological costs of the crisis mount. . . . The mega question -- what is the role of the U.S. government in the nation's economy? -- isn't just on the table, but at the center of the table."

"John McCain and Barack Obama acted Thursday as if either one could be the next victim of Wall Street's epic meltdown," David Saltonstall reports in the New York Daily News. "The supercharged environment led to some red-hot rhetoric on the campaign trail on the all-important -- and possibly decisive -- issue: Who can restore American prosperity?"

"The financial crisis has transformed the race, wiping away almost all other issues. In a purely political sense, the developments are highlighting economic anxiety and putting the spotlight on a topic that Democrats believe will benefit them," The New York Times' Jackie Calmes and Jeff Zeleny write.

"But what is worse for Mr. Obama and Mr. McCain is that they are on the sidelines and yet expected to act as if they have the best information available," they continue. "Another complication is that the candidates have to balance the political need to look boldly presidential against the danger of further agitating the markets or stoking Americans' anxiety."

"This is the September surprise," ABC's George Stephanopoulos said on "Good Morning America" Friday. The fall out from the current crisis is "probably going to do more to affect this presidential race than any other single factor."

At the end of a dismal messaging week for the McCain campaign, he's seeking to turn things around -- and he has a bit of window to make it happen. (Maybe one day to avoid another bad week of news cycles?)

Friday brings a McCain Chamber of Commerce speech in Wisconsin -- a late add to McCain's schedule where he'll seek to toss aside a week of poor "fundamentals" and bad surrogate work and confused radio interviews by going back to the basics.

A preview, from McCain's event Thursday night: "Republican presidential candidate John McCain brought a sharpened economic message with him to the state Thursday night, hammering Democratic rival Barack Obama as a job-killing, tax-hiking, do-nothing, old-school politician," per Greg J. Borowski of the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel.

"McCain accused Sen. Barack Obama of 'cheerleading' the gloomy financial news, urged the ouster of the chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, and said that Obama's running mate believes raising taxes is 'patriotic,' " Robert Barnes and Michael D. Shear write in The Washington Post.

Welcome to the GOP comfort zone: "John McCain is trying to shift the 2008 economic debate to an issue where Republicans historically have had an edge over Democrats: taxes," Greg Hitt writes in The Wall Street Journal. "Republicans have reason to hope a sharpened focus on taxes specifically will help Sen. McCain. That is because Sen. Obama is trying to do what no national politician has done since Ronald Reagan transformed the tax debate in 1980: win on a platform that includes significant tax increases."

Joe Biden helps makes the case for him: "It's time to be patriotic," he told ABC's Kate Snow, on the need for wealthier Americans to pay more taxes. "Time to jump in, time to be part of the deal, time to help America out of the rut, and the way to do that is they're still gonna pay less taxes than they did under Reagan."

McCain gets a boost from a Washington Post editorial: "It's fair to say that Mr. McCain has dramatically ramped up the regulatory rhetoric in the wake of the meltdown on Wall Street," the editorial reads. "However, when it comes to regulating financial institutions and corporate misconduct, Mr. McCain's record is more in keeping with his current rhetoric. . . . Mr. Obama's attack does not give a fair reading of the McCain record."

As for McCain's vow to "fire" the SEC commissioner, Chris Cox: "While the president nominates and the Senate confirms the SEC chair, a commissioner of an independent regulatory commission cannot be removed by the president," ABC's David Wright reports.

Obama does the economic thing as well on Friday, meeting with advisers in Florida: "Some of the most respected names in the business world were pitching in Friday, including billionaire investor Warren Buffett, former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker, former Treasury secretaries Robert Rubin, Lawrence Summers and Paul O'Neill and Laura Tyson, former head of the Council of Economic Advisers under President Clinton," the AP's Terence Hunt reports.

"Less than seven weeks before Election Day, the high-profile consultations appeared designed to portray Obama in a presidential-like setting, grappling with the nation's gravest problems and making decisions with the help of a big-name team of experts," Hunt writes.