The Bush Administration, which typically addresses the American people only when they want to scare us, trotted out the dude with the Harvard MBA to explain how Wall Street and Main Street can be friends forever. It was so compelling that John McCain had to stop campaigning so he too, could try to parse the intricacies of our complex, yet fragile economy, from El Presidento himself. 
And just when you thought the '08 presidential campaign couldn't get any nuttier. If another hurricane happens to rear it's ugly head in the next few weeks, we might be reduced to 1 debate and lots of fallacious ads. Sounds like a Republican plan to me. Why debate the issues when you can just get throw sound bites to the news media and the masses. Here's how it works. Make a very negative ad. Show it in a very small market. Make sure all the 24/7 media outlets know about it, and then start generating controversy even if you have to call the opposition. In fact, it's better if the opposition gets riled up. The controversy then begets more news coverage, much of it with links to the offending ad, or clips from on the morning and evening shows. You can expect to hear "Not God Bless America; God Damn America" many times in the next 5 weeks.
If there's an up side to the whole end-of-world-as-you-know it for the Republicans it might be this. The Republican VP candidate has all but disappeared from the news. This can only be good for the Republicans since her presence can only hurt the program.
Another upside would be that if we can save the economy then Bush/McGruff's retirement plans would remain viable. 700 billion dollars almost seems like a fair trade to get rid of these knuckleheads for good. Main Street may not be on board with a Wall Street buyout quite yet, but Main Street agrees on one thing; it's time for them to go.