Looks like Team Obama is finally hitting McCain where it ought to hurt- on his complete lack of interest or concern for the economy ever since the credit crunch hit.
This tough new ad shows McCain repeating the refrain “but the fundamentals of the economy are strong,” over and over again in recent months. After he foolishly repeated that line again on September 15, following the Merrill Lynch fire sale and the Lehman Brothers bust, and as AIG hung on for its financial life by a thread, he and Sarah Palin both insisted that everyone is just confusing his “verbiage” (a fancy choice of word for ‘word choice’). He was actually referring to the American workforce and American ingenuity, and those are still very strong. And as a matter of fact (taken to its logical Rovian conclusion), how dare Senator Obama insult the fine workers of America by suggesting that they are not strong, or that they have done anything wrong?
But, time and again, John McCain has brushed off the credit crisis with that “the fundamentals are strong” line, never once suggesting his own unique definition of the economic fundamentals–never, except after the Obama campaign jumped all over him for repeating this counterintuitive belief in the wake of such historic financial turmoil. Actually, Obama has been hitting McCain for saying this for a while now, but it is only now that the media started to notice.
Economists refer to a number of indicators as “the fundamentals” of the economy in order to measure the overall health of it. Here are some of the answers I have seen in a cursory web search for what those indicators are: Government deficits, savings rates , company profits, productivity, job growth, stability of the Banking system, purchasing power index, exports and imports balance, dollar value, gross domestic product…. Do any ONE of these appear strong to you, dear readers? When you look at all of these fundamentals, it kind of frightens you, doesn’t it?
Which is why those aren’t the fundamentals John McCain wants to talk about.
Inform Your Consent 
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