The debate is on!
Friday, September 26, 2008
WASHINGTON (AP) _ Republican presidential candidate John McCain reversed course and agreed to meet Democratic rival Barack Obama in a highly anticipated debate Friday night, having said earlier in the week that he would delay the showdown until Washington had addressed the financial crisis.
With less than 10 hours until the debate was scheduled to start, the McCain campaign announced that the Arizona senator would travel to the University of Mississippi. The campaign said that afterward McCain would fly back to Washington to continue working on the financial crisis.
The campaign's statement said McCain is optimistic that there has been progress toward a bipartisan agreement. But earlier in the week, McCain said he would delay the debate "until we have taken action to address this crisis."
McCain's call Wednesday to postpone the debate was his latest surprise move aimed at shaking up a race in which Obama would seem to have an inherent advantage, given the economic turmoil and the unpopular Bush presidency.
McCain was looking to cast himself as a bold leader, willing to set aside politics and put the needs of the nation first in a time of crisis. But there was a danger his stance could backfire if he is seen to be grandstanding on the financial bailout program while the U.S. economic situation deteriorated.
There were signs Friday that this might be the case, as such McCain supporters as former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee began to criticize the Arizona senator's decision.
Huckabee said the Republican made a "huge mistake" by even discussing canceling the debate.
"You can't just say, 'World, stop for a moment. I'm going to cancel everything,'" Huckabee told reporters Thursday night in Alabama. He said it's more important for voters to hear from the presidential candidates than for them to huddle with fellow senators in Washington.
The debate was to be the first of three and comes as the candidates are locked in a tight race. Most polls have shown Obama, a first-term Democratic senator seeking to become the first black president, tied or with a slight lead over McCain, a longtime Republican senator and former Vietnam prisoner of war.
McCain took a gamble when he announced his decision to skip the debate unless Washington addressed the economic crisis. He tried to appear above politics and as a leader on an issue that had overshadowed the presidential campaign and given him trouble. But Obama did not bow to McCain's challenge, and instead questioned why the Republican nominee couldn't handle two things at once — the debate and involvement in the bailout negotiations.
"Sen. McCain has no need to be fearful about a debate," Obama told reporters Thursday night. "He's a person of strong opinions and he's been expressing them on the campaign trail."
Obama had always planned to attend the debate and was onboard his plane preparing to take off when McCain's announcement was made. McCain quickly moved to his own private aircraft and headed South with his wife and former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani and his wife, Judith, on board.
An Associated Press-Knowledge Networks poll out Friday just before McCain's announcement showed the public overwhelmingly wanted the candidates to debate, 60 percent to 22 percent, with the rest undecided.
Just before McCain's announcement, Obama told reporters that he had spent Friday morning on the phone with Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and congressional leaders and he was optimistic that progress was being made toward a bailout deal.
"At this point, my strong sense is that the best thing that I can do, rather than to inject presidential politics into these delicate negotiations, is to go down to Mississippi and explain to the American people what is going on and my vision for leading the country over the next four years," Obama told reporters aboard his campaign plane as they prepared to travel to Mississippi.