McCain Dodges Keating Bullet, For Now

(NEWSER) - Traditional media outlets and on-the-spot amateurs alike captured the year's biggest US political moments. Here is Politico's look at some of the biggest scoops:

• Palin meets Couric: Interviewed by Katie Couric on CBS, Sarah Palin fumbled with softball questions such as which publications she reads. Democrats and Tina Fey pounced.
• Edwards indulges: Major media outlets ignored a report of John Edwards' extramarital affair, but the National Enquirer caught him in the act.

Plan would ease borrowing from retirement accounts

(NEWSER) - Barack Obama detailed an economic rescue plan today that includes incentives for job creation and a federal credit line for state and local governments, the Toledo Blade reports. Playing to voters in hard-hit Ohio as he preps for Wednesday's debate, Obama said, "I won’t pretend that this will be easy. We’re going to have to attach priorities." More»

GOP candidate compares Obama to Herbert Hoover on economy

(NEWSER) - John McCain painted a dismal picture of the economy today at a rally in Virginia, comparing Barack Obama’s solutions to Herbert Hoover’s while declaring himself the right candidate to fix the mess, the Virginian-Pilot reports. McCain also raised the specter of his flailing campaign in an effort to invigorate voters, warning that Barack Obama is “measuring the drapes” at the White House. More»

Economic crisis will ruin political, financial fortunes alike

(NEWSER) - Disaster’s dead ahead for John McCain, for Barack Obama, and for the rest of us, too, writes Rosa Brooks in the Los Angeles Times. McCain is “a dead man walking,” as he’ll soon find out. The "winner" will be a President Obama with no idea "how to keep the global economic crisis from sending all the rest of us to the bottom of the sea, right along with McCain and the GOP." More»

Mac has forgotten the lessons of the scandal that made him a better man

(NEWSER) - Barack Obama's camp resurrected the Keating Five as a “eye for an eye” campaign issue this week, after the McCain team revived Obama's sometime relationship with Bill Ayers, the former '60s-era radical. But the Obama folks missed what makes the 20-year-old scandal actually relevant, writes Walter Shapiro on Salon. In the crucible of that scandal, in which McCain admitted acting improperly to benefit a supporter, he vowed to commit himself to scrupulously clean politics and complete transparency. More»