Time to cry for America

Now I'm worried. President Bush gets on television, and instead of inspiring confidence, makes one panic. I would expect long lines outside of banks tomorrow, or at least folks on-line transferring money around like crazy. Not the big guys, but the normal people whose money probably falls well within FDIC guarantees but who are spooked by the whole panic, and will feel even less secure now than before the President's talk. I thought that the Northern Rock (I think that was its name) failure in the UK last year) was abnormal, with the pictures of Brits standing in line to take their money out -- not the norm, as that's something you expect to see in Argentina, or Mexico -- but we probably will see pictures like that tomorrow (Thursday) too, this time in the US. What a sad state of affairs.

And Mr. McCain wants to postpone the debate because of the crisis. Huh? Isn't this what being a leader is all about -- thinking about crisis, coming to a position, discussing it? When you are the President, you can't tell the terrorists, or the Russians, or the Chinese, or the Mexicans, or even the Canadians, "hang on a bit, we need to take a breather here. We're not ready." This kind of behavior makes me want to cry. What happened to America the superpower? We don't even seem like a mini-power at this point.

(There seems to be some problem with the timing of my postings, it is around 11 p.m. eastern time in the US as I write this)