WITH an assist from Joe the Plumber, John McCain delivered the best debate performance of his campaign last night.
And it was probably the best night of the entire general election so far for him, rivaled only by the electric evening on which Sarah Palin gave her acceptance speech during the GOP convention last month.
McCain finally shook off his barnacles and reminded voters of the higher taxes – the surest economy-killer ever envisioned – that come with all of Obama’s warmth and fuzziness.
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“The last president of the United States that tried that was Herbert Hoover, and we went from a deep recession into a depression,” McCain pointed out at the Hofstra debate.
In gallant response, Obama donned his green stockings and Robin Hood cap and promised he would only screw the rich and give their hard-earned money to the poor and to the not-so-poor.
“Joe, you’re rich! Congratulations!” McCain said mockingly, referring to Ohio plumber Joe Wurzelbacher, who recently confronted Obama over his plans to raise taxes on the small businesses, such as the one Joe hopes to purchase just as the American Dream comes within his grasp.
McCain last night made the strongest and most convincing argument yet that he is prepared to keep the federal government from making the current economic crisis even worse.
And, more convincingly than ever before, he sewed seeds of deep doubt that Obama and his promised tax hikes might just doom any possibility of recovering.
So unashamed was McCain of his economic principles, he even embraced with great gusto the need to cut taxes on businesses to spur job growth.
Standing up for businesses? Gasp!
“We need to encourage business, create jobs,” McCain said.
“Not ‘spread the wealth around,’ ” he added with ridicule.
“Spread the wealth around” was what Obama told Joe the Plumber his tax plan would do.
While it’s impossible to know right now if it’s too late for McCain to stage a comeback, one thing is for sure:
He’d be much better off today if he’d been this good in the first two debates.