The Big Lie Continues: McCain Was Against Regulation Before He Was For It

A decade ago, Sen. John McCain embraced legislation to broadly deregulate the banking and insurance industries, helping to sweep aside a thicket of rules established over decades in favor of a less restricted financial marketplace that proponents said would result in greater economic growth.

Now, as the Bush administration scrambles to prevent the collapse of the American International Group (AIG), the nation's largest insurance company, and stabilize a tumultuous Wall Street, the Republican presidential nominee is scrambling to recast himself as a champion of regulation to end "reckless conduct, corruption and unbridled greed" on Wall Street.

Let me just rewrite that second paragraph a bit:

Now, as the McCain campaign starts tanking in the face of horrendous economic news (not to mention a candidate who says he knows nothing about economics and who supported the very system that led to the crisis on Wall Street), John McCain himself has had a 'deathbed conversion," flip-flopping 180 degrees on government regulation of the banking and insurance industries.

I also love how McCain helped push through the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, which "aimed to make the country's financial institutions competitive by removing the Depression-era walls between banking, investment and insurance companies."  As the Washington Post puts it, "McCain now condemns the executives at those companies for pursuing the ambitions that the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act made possible."

In short, John McCain played a major role in causing the banking and financial crisis we're in. He knows that's politically disastrous, so he's desperately scrambling to claim he was against something he was for. I believe it's known as the "Big Lie," something the McCain campaign has become known for.

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