HONOLULU, Hawaii – Barack Obama tried to go for a walk outside the apartment building where spent many formative years and where his grandmother, Madelyn Dunham, lay dying.

It was a simple act, one it takes only a moment to consider and appreciate. Imagine the neighborhood you grew up in. More than the neighborhood in which you raise your children (if you have them), the neighborhood of your youth holds more power, more mystery, more therapeutic powers.

Your neighborhood quite probably lives in your memory more vividly than it did when you scampered or strode about in it as a child or young adult. Mine certainly does. You remember the trees you climbed, how the sky peaked through the leaves. You remember the sidewalk, the cracks you jumped over, the slippery parts when it rained. You remember the gusts of wind that – no matter the season – could steal you away to an instant daydream or carry the whiff of a neighbor’s baking pie or your mother’s browning pot roast.

Almost everyone has a neighborhood. And for almost everyone it is a more wonderful place in memory than in reality. For this reason, going home brings some degree of peace. Neighborhood peace. The peace of the familiar. The peace of the remembered. The peace of something sacred, even if looks to everyone else so irretrievably plain. This peace that can be found, is it infinite peace? The peace of the poet or philosopher? No. Usually, it’s transient, human peace.  Fragile. Conflicted. Warped. And it’s all we’ve got; all the indifferent universe will grant — even in times of profound grief.

For a few moments, Obama sought this type of peace. Traveling press cameras were there, of course. Obama shrugged. He knows the drill. His grief, though, was evident. And why not? Tute (his nickname for Madelyn) is the last living link to those who raised him. An orphan since 1995, Obama is about to know a barren new life — one without any of the rocks upon which he has always tried to stand.

Fate created an odd collision of emotions for Obama.

House before Obama took his lonely walk, his campaign manager, David Plouffe, told reporters the campaign now sees a “clear path” to victory. Plouffe said no John Kerry state is in jeopardy and several George Bush states are now winnable. Plouffe said the Obama tide could sweep up Montana, Indiana and West Virginia.

The key to this optimism can be found in early voting statistics. Republicans have historically out-organized Democrats on early and absentee voting. Not this cycle. See these numbers, all provided by Jon Carson, Obama-Biden campaign field director.

Democrats are voting early at significantly higher rates than Republicans compared to 2004:

North Carolina – 2008 to date

All Votes By Party Registration

DEMOCRAT
520,064
56%

REPUBLICAN
254,515
27%

UNAFFILIATED
155,476
17%

North Carolina – 2004 Final Early and Absentee Vote Numbers

All Votes By Party Registration

DEMOCRAT
479,305
48%

REPUBLICAN
363,294
37%

UNAFFILIATED
149,632
15%
Nevada – 2008 to date

All Voting

DEMOCRAT
107,122
53%

REPUBLICAN
63,577
32%

UNAFFILIATED
30,938
15%

Total
201,637

Nevada – 2004 Final Early and Absentee Vote Numbers

All Votes By Party Registration

DEMOCRAT
147,408
45%

REPUBLICAN
135,743
41%

UNAFFILIATED
45,211
14%

Iowa – 2008 to date

All Voting

DEMOCRAT
132,882
50%

REPUBLICAN
76,689
29%

UNAFFILIATED
53,787
20%

Iowa – 2004 Final Early and Absentee Vote Numbers

All Voting

DEMOCRAT
185,115
48%

REPUBLICAN
118,167
30%

UNAFFILIATED
86,071
22%

New Mexico – 2008 to date

All Voting

DEMOCRAT
84,123
56%

REPUBLICAN
49,145
33%

UNAFFILIATED
16,484
11%

New Mexico – 2004 Final Early and Absentee Vote Numbers

All Voting

DEMOCRAT
178,216
50%

REPUBLICAN
132,505
38%

UNAFFILIATED
42,461
12%

Colorado – 2008 to date

All Voting

DEMOCRAT
184,352
39%

REPUBLICAN
181,424
38%

UNAFFILIATED
110,284
23%

Colorado – 2004 Final Early and Absentee Vote Numbers

All Voting

DEMOCRAT
307,244
34%

REPUBLICAN
384,642
42%

UNAFFILIATED
221,336
24%

Florida – 2008 to date

All Voting

DEMOCRAT
650,363
43%

REPUBLICAN
651,700
43%

UNAFFILIATED
225,980
14%

Florida – 2004 Final Early and Absentee Vote Numbers

All Voting

DEMOCRAT
1,056,986
42%

REPUBLICAN
1,097,616
43%

UNAFFILIATED
386,367
15%

New and sporadic voting Democrats are voting early at higher rates than new or sporadic voting Republicans:

Colorado –  2008 to date

There are 233,878 new Democrats – 101,595 (43%) have requested mail in ballots.

There are 195,794 new Republicans – 70,248 (36%) have requested mail in ballots.

20% of all Democrats voting by mail have never voted in a general election before.

North Carolina –  2008 to date

There are 816,801 new Democrats – 70,561 (9%) have voted early.

There are 491,106 sporadic Democrats – 91,758 (19%) have voted early.

There are 533,490 new Republicans – 30,676 (6%) have requested mail in ballots.

There are 397,719 sporadic Republicans – 56,418 (14%) have voted early.

18% of all Democrats voting early are new Democrats who have never voted in a general election before and there are a lot more New Democrats.

15% of all Republican voting early are new Republicans

Nevada –  2008 to date

There are 170,672 new Democrats – 21,566 (13%) have voted early.

There are 69,979 sporadic Democrats – 13,305 (19%) have voted early.

There are 98,262 new Republicans – 8,243 (8%) have requested mail in ballots.

There are 52,019 sporadic Republicans – 7,256 (14%) have voted early.

40% of all Democrats voting early are new or Sporadic Democrats

30% of all Republican voting early are new or Sporadic Republicans

Iowa –  2008 to date

There are 103,449 new Democrats – 12,874 (12%) have voted early.

There are 92,479 sporadic Democrats – 20,686 (22%) have voted early.

There are 73,725 new Republicans – 5,414 (7%) have requested mail in ballots.

There are 71,647 sporadic Republicans – 11,577 (16%) have voted early.

On the day his campaign manager told the world he may be the next leader of the free world, Obama strode down Young Street behind his grandmother’s apartment in blue jeans, brown flip flops, sunglasses and a shirt — looking for transient peace in he world he knows will soon engulf him and in which he walk more alone and over more rocks than ever.

FAYETTEVILLE, N.C. – TBR chatted up David Axelrod, senior strategist for Barack Obama, during Obama’s rally here at the Crown Coliseum.

I asked him if there was any hangover from Colin Powell’s support of the invasion of Iraq, which he restated today, in the context of Powell’s endorsement of Obama.

“No, I mean, have you seen his (Powell’s) numbers?”

It struck me as a purely political answer to a question that turns on the significant strategic difference between Powell and Obama on Iraq: Powell again said today invading was the right move and that he principally regrets the failure to manage the war’s aftermath. Obama has called and continues to call the Iraq War the greatest strategic blunder in modern American history.

Then it struck me. I actually hadn’t seen any numbers on Powell. Not lately, at least.

TBR did some checking and the most recent public numbers on Powell were from 2004 (found at PollingReport.com, link here: http://www.pollingreport.com/P.htm, scroll down, Powell is near the bottom in the sequence of polls). A Wall Street Journal/NBC poll of 500 adults from Dec. 9-13, 2004 showed 40 percent of respondents viewed Powell “very positively,” while 29 percent viewed him “somewhat positively.” A Nov. 9-14 Harris Survey of 1,014 adults revealed Powell’s excellent/good rating at 66 percent, his fair/poor at 32.

Very good numbers, indeed. But not recent numbers. Obama’s campaign may have some of their own, which may have been why Axelrod said that no one who hadn’t yet endorsed Obama trumped Powell’s stature or political impact.

“Colin Powell is not viewed as a partisan figure. The importance is in the timing. At a time when Republicans are trying so hard to undermine confidence in Obama, there is no more important endorsement than Powell’s,” Axelrod said.

ST. LOUIS — The Bourbon Room caught up with first-term Missouri Sen. Claire McCaskill, the Democrat who occupies Harry S Truman’s former seat in the Senate (not the seat itself, but in the line of those who have succeeded The Man from Independence).

TBR asked McCaskill if Barack Obama gaffed his response to Joe the Plumber about his tax policy and his desire to “spread the wealth” with higher taxes on the rich.

McCaskill: “I think he would probably say he could have said it better.  What he was trying to drive is this point – John McCain believes, just as George Bush does, that tax cuts should go to the very wealthy at the top and somehow we’ll all benefit from them.  Barack Obama believes the opposite; that it’s time to give the middle class a tax cut, the small businessman a tax cut.  And that’s what he was trying to convey. And it’s a matter of who gets the tax cut, not a matter of spreading wealth.”

TBR also asked about the crowd of 100,000 beneath the Gateway Arch.

McCaskill: “I’ve never seen a crowd like this in Missouri and I’ve been to a lot of large presidential rallies over the last several election cycles. The energy is unique and different and I think it is going to make the difference on election day. You know, this election is one for the history books in a lot of ways and I think turnout is going to be another chapter in the history book.  It is a historic election and I do think this notion that there will be low turnout among young voters and low turnout among first-time time voters, I think that is going to be one that is going to be abandoned in this election.

And what about Gov. Sarah Palin?

McCaskill: “We should never stand in judgment of other citizens in terms of their patriotism.  We all acknowledge that John McCain is a patriot and so is Sarah Palin and they ought to do the same for our supporters and for Senator Obama and Senator Biden.  This notion that some parts of the country are more patriotic than others, I think its offensive.

TBR also asked about the tone of McCain’s campaign: the robo-calls, mailers and references to Obama economic policies as promoting welfare or socialism (recently, two GOP Sens. Susan Collins and Norm Coleman of respectively, Maine and Minnesota, have criticized the McCain robo calls).

McCaskill: “You know what John McCain is doing this campaign makes me sad, because I don’t think it’s who he is.  I think he has somehow lost the notion of country first and honor, in an incredible drive to win. And you know, I don’t want him to win because I think Barack Obama will be a better president. But I think he’s not serving himself well or his record well by running a campaign that is so negative and so misleading.”

ST. LOUIS – Democratic nominee Barack Obama today called John McCain “the first politician in history to call a tax cut for working people ‘welfare,’ in a policy broadside aimed at McCain attacks that Obama tax credit for those who pay no federal income taxes amount to a government give-away.

“Lately, Senator McCain has been attacking my middle class tax cut. He actually said it goes to, “those who don’t pay taxes,” even though it only goes to working people who are already getting taxed on their paycheck,” Obama intends to say, according to excerpts of remarks released by the campaign. 

“That’s right, Missouri – John McCain is so out of touch with the struggles you are facing that he must be the first politician in history to call a tax cut for working people “welfare.” 

Senior Obama advisers say they must confront the ‘welfare’ charge directly to block McCain from portraying the Democratic nominee as using the tax code to promote welfare. Obama advisers say today’s speech may foreshadow TV ads on the subject, forcing McCain to defend his contention that workers who pay payroll taxes – but not income taxes – are somehow under serving of tax breaks.

  In today’s remarks, Obama said the difference on the issue comes down to “values.” The values debate has often worked against national Democrats but Obama and his team are determined to fight the values debate on the economic battlefield – where Democrats have been trying to turn the debate since losing the 2004 election. 

“We are both offering tax cuts” Obama’s prepared remarks say. “The difference is who we’re cutting taxes for. It comes down to values – in America, do we simply value wealth, or do we value the work that creates it? For eight years, we’ve seen what happens when we put the extremely wealthy and well connected ahead of working people. Now, John McCain thinks that the way to rebuild this economy is to double down on George Bush’s policy of giving more and more tax breaks to those at the very top in the false hope that it will all trickle down. I think it’s time to rebuild the middle class in this country, and that is the choice in this election.” 

Obama also intends to turn the welfare debate against McCain by describing his call for an extension of the Bush tax cut and new tax cuts for corporations as amounting to welfare for the rich.

“The only “welfare” in this campaign is John McCain’s plan to give another $200 billion in tax cuts to the wealthiest corporations in America – including $4 billion in tax breaks to big oil companies that ran up record profits under George Bush,” Obama’s prepared remarks said. . “That’s who John McCain is fighting for. But we can’t afford four more years like the last eight. George Bush and John McCain are out of ideas, they are out of touch, and if you stand with me in 17 days they will be out of time.”

Obama advisers say McCain’s  ”welfare” line of attack carries a subliminal racial component they believe McCain is stoking as they say he has with mailers and rob calls suggesting Obama’s affiliated with terrorists and cares more about Hollywood than America.

McCain advisers call the tax debate a vital policy dispute, one that shines a light on who and who does not pay income taxes – an argument exemplified, McCain advisers say, by the attention brought to the question  ”Joe the Plumber” asked Obama about his call for higher income taxes on those earning more than $250,000.

TOLEDO, Ohio – The foot-stomping crowd of 3,100 wanted more red meat, but Barack Obama gave then dense policy prescriptions for what he called “an immediate economic emergency.”

In the end, the capacity crowd at the Sea Gate Convention Center left happy, exiting doors to urgent chants from Obama volunteers: “Go vote now. Vote early. Go vote now.”

I’ll get to Obama’s four-point plan in a second, but I want to first note new lines to his stump speech about frugality.

Obama said for years “everyone was living beyond their means.” That was true of Wall Street (greedy buying,selling and leveraging), Washington (too many tax cuts for the rich and too much spending) and even Main Street (where people knew they couldn’t afford homes but “bought them anyway.”)

“We’ve lived through an era of easy money,” Obama said, noting this era was coming to an end — whether we like it or not.

On policy, Obama outlined four new ideas:

* Two-year lifting of the 10 percent tax penalty on early withdrawals from 401K plans, up to $10,000 (regular withdrawal taxes would apply, consult your tax adviser for details).

* 90-day moratorium on home foreclosures for lenders accessing funds in the $700 billion rescue plan. This, Obama aides said, is to expedite the re-work and re-purchase of distressed mortgages (not at face value, by the way, as John McCain proposes, but at a price below “face value” and above “fire sale.”)

* Credit line from the Federal Reserve to cash-strapped states and cities to help with short-term credit needs.

* Tax credits for new job creation.

Obama also wants to help Detroit to re-tool and build more energy-efficient cars and provide more federal support for extended unemployment benefits.

Total price tag for these ideas: $60 billion over two years, according to economic adviser Jason Furman.

The RNC has noted Obama criticized Hillary Clinton before the Super Tuesday primaries for proposing a 90-day foreclosure moratorium.

Republicans call this a flip-flop. Furman says the criticism was more directed at Clinton’s call for an interest freeze on home mortgages, though transcripts from the time don’t substantiate that.

Furman’s defense is Clinton’s moratorium was universal, while Obama’s plan is targeted only to lenders who seek help from the taxpayer-funded rescue plan.

Obama’s speech also mentioned the need “to set priorities as never before.” To that end, Obama said he would “have to defer on some things we’ll have to do without.”

He explicity said doing without his middle class tax cuts is not an option. Obama has built a huge wall around these tax cuts, elevating them to untouchable status – no matter what happens in the coming months to the federal deficit (which is creeping toward $500 billion this fiscal year). This promise, it appears, will be among the first that will test Obama and the Democratic Congress he expects to work with if he wins on Nov. 4.

It may not be stretching things to say the fate of Obama’s entire first-term domestic agenda may ride on how fully he and Congress live up to this promise.

The topic: the economy. The location: Toledo, Ohio.
I was first to report on Tuesday of last week that Obama on Oct. 5 held a conference call with his economic team and ordered up new policies.
Obama and his economic team believe the economy will get worse before it gets better (his Nashville debate answer to that question notwithstanding).
Obama ordered new policy ideas to address an expected jump in unemployment, shrunken consumer spending, and a larger number of uninsured.
Today’s speech will outline these new policy prescriptions. They are meant to add specifics to Obama’s economic rhetoric in the home stretch of the campaign. They also are designed to signal to congressional Democrats what Obama intends to do in his first 100 or 200 days to deal with the economy. In other words, today’s speech is as much about winning the economic debate as it is giving the country a peek at Obama’s legislative road map.

Developing….

TOLEDO, Ohio — This has been a weekend where both campaigns have urged the other to restrain their surrogates, their crowds and each other to demonstrate restraint where issues of race are concerned.

John McCain’s campaign manager, Rick Davis, demanded that Barack Obama personally apologize to McCain for the comments of a supporter, Rep. John Lewis of Georgia. Lewis, a hero of the Civil Right movement, said on Saturday that some of McCain’s recent rallies reminded him of the worst moments of the late Alabama Democrat George Wallace’s segregationist career.

Obama, when asked about Lewis’s comments today during a door-knocking photo opportunity in Holland, Ohio, said he was too busy “shaking hands” to respond.

Late today, speaking to supporters at his Crystal City, Va., headquarters, McCain said this about the homestretch of the campaign and Wednesday’s final debate with Obama.

“It’s closing up in Virginia, but we’re gonna win in Virginia and we’re going to have to get out our vote and that’s what a lot of it’s going to come down to. Tomorrow Sarah and I are going to be down in the Norfolk area – I believe, if somebody has our schedule – and we’ll be spending time campaigning in Virginia too. We also gotta cross, go across Ohio, Pennsylvania, as you know. And I don’t have to tell you what – not insulting your intelligence – but Colorado, Nevada, and New Mexico are also going to be important. So we’re spending a lot of time and after I whip his you know what in this debate we’re going to be going out…

The rest of McCain’s statement trails off as supporters first laugh nervously and then break out in applause.

“Whip.”

Is that the word that best helps McCain make the case that there’s nothing in his past, his rhetoric, or his rallies that carries the faintest whiff of racial insensitivity?

Even as a harmless metaphor — which two senior McCain advisers genuinely insist it was — was that the kind imagery McCain really sought?

After two days of racial grievances aired by McCain’s camp about what Lewis said, it seems more than odd that McCain would use a verb that describes what many powerful whites did to powerless blacks during the worst days of Jim Crow.

The Obama campaign took no public offense.

Several Republicans, when made aware of McCain’s comments, recoiled. Many Democrats found the use of “whip” outrageous. The early read, however, appears to be that it will be seen in most quarters as an unfortunate choice of words.

It most certainly was that. Even McCain advisers admit that (they’re actually far more worried about McCain recklessly raising expectations for his performance against Obama).

On a day when Hillary Clinton hit the trail with gusto in Scranton, Pa., for the Obama-Biden ticket, The Bourbon Room believes it’s at least worth asking if McCain would ever have said he intended to “whip” any part of Hillary.

DETROIT -With national tracking polls showing Barack Obama widening or maintaining his lead over John McCain (See Gallup here: http://www.gallup.com/poll/110740/Gallup-Daily-Obama-Moves-50-42-Lead.aspx and Rasmussen Reports here: www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/election_20082/2008_presidential_election/daily_presidential_tracking_poll), the Democratic nominee this afternoon said his GOP rival “stood there,” paralyzed by the chaos on Wall Street and subjecting America to a “Katrina-like” reaction when the nation needed more.

Straying from prepared remarks on his nearly ubiquitous TelePrompTer, Obama said when the financial pillars on Wall Street began to fall:  “…his (McCain’s) first response to the greatest financial meltdown in generations was a Katrina-like response. Sort of stood there. Said ‘the fundamentals of the economy are strong.’ That’s why he’s been shifting positions these last two weeks, looking for photo-ops, trying to figure out what to say and what to do.”

The orginial remarks did not include the reference to Katrina or that McCain just “stood there.”  Here are the remarks as prepared for delivery: “That’s why his first response to the greatest fiscal meltdown in generations was to say that ‘the fundamentals of the economy are strong.’ That’s why he’s been shifting positions these last two weeks, looking for a photo-op, and trying to figure out what to say and what to do.”

Linking McCain to Katrina is something Obama has avoided in the campaign, instead listing it as part of a long line of Bush administration failures.  The reference is even more sensitive in light of McCain’s decision to scrub the first day of the Republican National Convention to turn party activities toward fund-raising for potential victims of Hurricane Gustav.

Moreover, while it’s true McCain’s campaign has spent considerable time digging out from McCain’s “fundamentals of the economy are strong” remark, Obama and McCain took almost identical approaches to the Wall Street rescue legislation now before Congress.

Both called for outside oversight, taxpayer protections, foreclosure relief and caps on CEO golden parachutes in separate speeches on Sept. 19. In fact, McCain’s plan came a few hours before Obama’s.

Read McCain’s speech here: //www.johnmccain.com/Informing/News/Speeches/9a604256-0519-46e6-a1ce-e70798b39ec2.htm

Read Obama’s remarks here: www.barackobama.com/2008/09/19/remarks_of_senator_barack_obam_119.php

Campaign spokesman Bill Burton said Obama’s impromptu Katrina reference may not happen again.

“I don’t know that it’s really going to remain timely,” he said.

As for the rescue plan before Congress, top Obama officials said the senator will support it. The only potential fly in the ointment is if the legislative language doesn’t match the outline of the deal described to Obama by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

Don’t worry. It will. Senior Obama advisers spent this afternoon reading the latest draft text and say Obama’s on board.

As for the changes made to the bill over the weekend, Obama’s not a big fan of the House-GOP language seeking a bond insurance guarantee for mortgage-backed paper purchased by Treasury. Private-sector insurance premiums will support the plan. Obama doesn’t think the idea can work, unlike economist Larry Kudlow, who thinks it can (Read why here:  http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=YWE3ZTg5MDZjOTI2MDA4MjYxMGQ3ZDg1YzI5MTBmOWE=).

Since the insurance guarantee is only an option, it’s not a big deal for Obama or, apparently, congressional Democratic leaders who think just as little of it as Obama.

Obama also doesn’t oppose the striking of funds in the rescue bill that could have been funneled to  housing advocates and other community organizations such as ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now). A senior adviser said Obama “supports the housing provisions that are in the bill,” but declined repeated attempts by The Bourbon Room to find out if Obama tried to protect the money that might have gone to ACORN or other groups. If he did, he failed. If he didn’t, ACORN knows it by now.

Obama also likes the addition of a so-called financial stability fee to be assessed on bailed-out firms if they recover but the taxpayers don’t recover billions paid out in the original rescue package. This fee was originally sought by Democrats as part of the price of the bailout, but it morphed into fee to be assessed only after 5 years, and only if the rescue package doesn’t pay for itself by then.

Obama called for such a fee on Sept. 23 and his advisers call it a “unique” contribution to the final bill. They also concede it’s merely a “backstop” to help taxpayers five years hence. The Bourbon Room wonders just how much we will all remember of this rescue legislation in 2013, a full presidential term and presidential campaign from now.

If there is one question transfixing market watchers in America and in exchanges the world over it is this: what will become of American International Group?

The Treasury Department and Federal Reserve are wrestling with this multi-billion-dollar question. The answer will not only affect AIG, but probably the stock market, banks and a variety of businesses and governments holding AIG-backed insurance policies.

So, what do the presidential campaigns have to say about this test of leadership?

Next to nothing.

The only official comment from John McCain’s campaign is through spokesman Tucker Bounds, who says “no taxpayer dollars should be involved in a bailout of AIG.”

But a bailout is not on the table. So that doesn’t get matters very far.

But it’s more than Barack Obama’s campaign has to say, which is nothing.

On background, senior Obama economic advisers say any comment about AIG in the heat of this crisis would be “irresponsible.”

One adviser said: “None of us (in Obama’s inner circle) have access to AIG’s books. Therefore questions about what the government should do an unanswerable.”

A senior economic adviser to McCain’s campaign said there’s no way to evaluate the risk an AIG collapse would have on the markets, although he said many legitimately fear the effect could be “systemic.”

That means it could trigger other failures as capital markets tighten and short-sellers abandon once robust institutions that don’t have massive ready capital reserves.

What about a bridge loan, with repayment dates and interest charged? Does either campaign favor that remedy?

Not on the record. Not even on background.

A top Obama adviser said it’s simply too early to advise the Fed and Treasury whether it should use a loan to “backstop” AIG until it can find more capital and boost either its stock price or credit rating.

“At this late hour, there are no good options for the government or the private sector,” the Obama adviser said.

Certainly the Fed, Treasury and private firms evaluating AIG understand that. But they must wrestle with these issues in real time — possibly they have less than 24 hours to come up with a plan — while the presidential campaigns have the luxury of waiting to see what happens and offering pronouncements then.

A senior McCain adviser said the question about a bridge loan to AIG with repayment dates “was a good and hard one.” He then proceeded to paraphrase the late Massachusetts Sen. Paul Tsongas who would often say: “that’s a good, hard question, now let me see how I can avoid answering it.”

The truth is, neither presidential campaign wants to answer the AIG question. This is mostly because it can’t — campaigns can’t pry open AIG’s books like Treasury, the Fed and possible suitors can.

Campaigns can set broad principles or goals. But the truth of this fast-moving Wall Street crisis is this — forces are in motion that haven’t been seen before and government institutions are making moves never before contemplated (see Bear Stearns).

That’s why presidential campaigns enjoy politicking at times such as these. And why government institutions sweat bullets as they try to solve problems.

GOLDEN, Colo. –

Awaiting Barack Obama here at the jam-packed Colorado School of Mines.

And though the Obama campaign rails constantly about GOP attempts to make a big election “about small things,” this morning the campaign and the DNC are enjoying gales of laughter at the expense of John McCain’s economic adviser, Douglas Holtz-Eakin.

In a session with reporters today, Holtz-Eakin was asked:

Q: “What has he (McCain) done on (the) Commerce Committee (which McCain chaired from 2003-2005) that will convince Americans he understands financial markets?

Holtz-Eakin:  “He didn’t have jurisdiction over financial markets, but first and foremost he did this (Holtz-Eakin holds up his BlackBerry), telecommunications of the United states, the premier innovation in the past 15 years comes right through the Commerce Committee. So you’re looking at the miracle that John McCain helped create.”

Q: Did he regulate the industry?

“He both regulated and de-regulated the industry as appropriate.”

Privately, McCain’s camp knows this a significant gaffe, eerily reminiscent of Al Gore’s much-maligned (though contextually within bounds) assertion that through his work to boost federal research he helped create the internet.

The only saving grace for McCain is that he didn’t say it on camera.

There’s now an effort in McCain-land to portray Holtz-Eakin as bungling an attempt at humor. Those present say there was no sense Holtz-Eakin was trying to be funny, even allowing that a former director of the Congressional Budget Office might be uniquely able to disguise a joke.

Bill Burton, spokesman for Obama, said the following via e-mail sent to BlackBerries across the land:

“If John McCain hadn’t said that ‘the fundamentals of our economy are strong’ on the day of one of our nation’s worst financial crises, the claim that he invented the BlackBerry would have been the most preposterous thing said all week.”

A senior adviser to McCain, Matt McDonald, said that the senator “laughed” when he Holtz-Eakin’s  comment.

“He would not claim to be the inventor of anything, much less the BlackBerry,” McDonald said. “This was obviously a boneheaded joke by a staffer.”

It wasn’t obvious to those who witnessed Holtz-Eakin’s BlackBerry brandishing. What is obvious is that “small things” in this campaign clearly are in the eye of the beholder.