Ayers, The Issue

Candidate McCain's focus on Candidate Obama and Professor Ayers is an odd thing.

It seems unlikely to affect the election, which nows seems entirely determined by reactions to the markets. McCain's understanding of the situation is better only in that he assigns important responsibility to the GSEs, worse in that he has been kind of flailing around and that his latest mortgage proposal is a flat-out bailout of reckless behavior. Neither candidate understands the banking markets, or the measures required to minimize the damage to them, or the limitations on the help such stabilization provides the larger economy. Before this, McCain could argue that Obama isn't ready for the Presidency. Now it seems that neither of them are ready to handle our financial problems -- so Obama's relative callowness is remarkably diminished. It's obvious that a Republican Administration has fumbled the past month badly, and that they are clearly associated with many of the regulatory problems leading up to this. The Democrats bear important responsibility too, but that is far less clear. So the crisis has minimized Obama's relative weaknesses, and reminded voters of Republican incompetence. They are going to their initial instinct to vote against the Republican.

So raising the Ayers relationship and the background questions is unlikely to matter much, and it is likely to agitate the political debate. On the other hand, they are legitimate questions that the press should have addressed a year ago. It hardly seems irresponsible to notice the absence of scrutiny before we elect the guy. Then again, if McCain was going to raise those issues, shouldn't have done so when there was time to discuss them? But it looked like he wouldn't need to, so why get everybody all worked up?

The background questions capsulize the larger situation: our elites have departed so far from factual, reasoned discussion, and neglected the fundamental issues so completely, that we now find ourselves without any good choices. No choice leads toward any solution. We're just wandering around here.