By now it’s obvious that George W. Bush, who never quite got the hang of his POTUS job, or what a job is for that matter, can barely be bothered to go through the motions. He had to be pried out of the White House yesterday to deliver two minutes of platitudes about the financial crisis, an appearance Chris Matthews compared to a cuckoo popping out of a clock.

BTW, this is how a real president speaks to the nation about a financial crisis.

Things Are Being Done, but there’s grumbling that they aren’t the right things. I think we’re seeing a lot of fingers poking into a lot of holes in the dyke.

John McCain’s response so far has been so bone-headed that even Sebastian Mallaby is shocked.

John McCain has just demonstrated his vulnerability as a presidential candidate. Speaking from prepared remarks at an Iowa rally today, he said that he would fire Chris Cox, the chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission. This outburst demonstrates McCain’s ignorance, his impetuousness and his vindictive streak. Not bad for one remark. …

…McCain is a loner rather than a team player. He is a political brawler rather than a manager. The financial turmoil is raising questions about how he’d perform in a crisis.

Are you watching this, America?

Obama’s response:

The Illinois senator said he would be discussing the Fed-Treasury proposal with his top economic advisers on Friday morning. Among those who have been advising Obama on his response to the financial crisis are former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker and former U.S. Treasury secretaries Lawrence Summers and Robert Rubin.

“Given the gravity of this situation, and based on conversations I have had with both Secretary Paulson and Chairman Bernanke, I have asked my economic team to refrain from presenting a more detailed blue-print of how an immediate plan might be structured until the Treasury and the Federal Reserve have had an opportunity to present their proposal.”

Obama said it was critical that the markets and public have confidence in the Fed and Treasury’s efforts and that their work be “unimpeded by partisan wrangling.”

There’s a lot more to this statement; read at the link.

McCain’s surrogates on the cable television politics shows: “Taxes liberal taxes liberal boogaboogaboogabooga.”

McCain campaign: Barack Obama is black and will steal money from your sweet white grandmother.

Help.

Related links:

Sean-Paul Kelley, “The Day Capitalism Died”

Joseph Stiglitz, “The Fruit of Hypocrisy”

Paul Krugman, “Crisis Endgame”

Eugene Robinson, “Failing Econ 101”

Update: Why Lehman Brothers crashed.