Thursday Post Mortem

The most recent rendering of what happened at that White House meeting Thursday comes from the AP, headlined "A Bad Day for the GOP." Like other accounts, it says that the plan that was close to acceptance was stopped by House Republicans, who presented their own plan, the major premise of which the Republican Treasury Secretary said wouldn't work.

But this article's writer, Charles Babington, provides a new detail: At one point, several minutes into the session, Obama said it was time to hear from McCain. According to a Republican who was there, "all he said was, 'I support the principles that House Republicans are fighting for.'" Some at the table took that to mean the conservatives' alternative proposal, which stands little chance of passage."

A late night meeting called to try to salvage a plan broke up when House Republicans essentially boycotted it. Babington writes: "This is the president's own party," said Rep. Barney Frank, a top Democratic negotiator who attended both meetings. "I don't think a president has been repudiated so strongly by the congressional wing of his own party in a long time."

By midnight, it was hard to tell who had suffered a worse evening, Bush or McCain. McCain, eager to shore up his image as a leader who rises above partisanship, was undercut by a fierce political squabble within his own party's ranks.

The consequences could be worse for Bush, and for millions of Americans if the impasse sends financial markets tumbling, as some officials fear. Closed-door negotiations were to resume Friday, but it was unclear whether House Republicans would attend.

Republicans and Democrats alike seemed unsure which way McCain was leaning. His campaign's statement late Thursday shed little light.
"At this moment, the plan that has been put forth by the administration does not enjoy the confidence of the American people," it said. It was unclear whether McCain would attend Friday night's scheduled debate against Democratic nominee Barack Obama in Oxford, Miss."

The New York Times story this morning on these events adds some details as well as more evocative language. Of particular note: McCain met with House GOPers before the White House meeting. Right now, if I were Rachel Maddow, I'd be trying to get somebody to talk me down from the suspicion that Thursday events were all an elaborate set-up for something Friday that would cast McCain as the hero and embarrass Obama, perhaps by McCain announcing he's convinced the House GOPers to go along--but not until Obama is in Mississippi for the debate. I may be giving McCain too much credit, or I may just be paranoid. But if I'm wrong, this indeed was a perilously bad day for Republicans and potentially for the country and its future.