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[Gene GeRue <genegerue AT ruralize.com>]

A flip-flop of this magnitude confirms what I already feared: McCain  
does not know what his values are and he is not at all the maverick he  
likes to make out to be; he is just one more posturing and pandering  
politician. As Don intimated, politicians will be falling over  
themselves trying to outdo each other on bailouts and we taxpayers and  
our progeny will get to pay the interest on all the billions that  
their vote-pandering plans cost. We who know how mortgages get made  
are rolling our eyes and shaking our heads. The cost of making yet  
another new mortgage, and the cost of loss--ha ha--to the original  
lender and the inequity to all the rest of the borrowers who signed  
loans they could handle but will get zero recognition for using common  
sense all add up to economic insanity, inequity and stupidity.

I predict that this is just the beginning.

This excerpt from a NYT article titled McCain, in Shift, Seeks U.S.  
Help for Homeowners spells out the McCain flip-flop more fully that my  
previous post:

Senator John McCain, who drew criticism last month after he warned  
against broad government action to solve the deepening mortgage  
crisis, pivoted Thursday and called for the government to help  
qualified homeowners with subprime mortgages refinance and get  
federally guaranteed 30-year mortgages.

“There is nothing more important than keeping alive the American dream  
to own your home, and priority number one is to keep well-meaning,  
deserving home owners who are facing foreclosure in their homes,” Mr.  
McCain said in Brooklyn, where he held a round-table discussion with  
small-business owners.

Mr. McCain, an Arizona Republican, said his plan would apply only to  
people who have subprime mortgages on their primary residences who  
could show that they would be able to meet the terms of a new, 30-year  
fixed-rate mortgage. He also called for the Department of Justice to  
investigate the lending industry.

Mr. McCain did not mention how much his plan would cost, but his  
economic advisers were scheduled to brief reporters later in the day.

In both tone and substance, Mr. McCain’s remarks were something of a  
departure from a speech the senator delivered last month in California  
in which he warned that “it is not the duty of government to bail out  
and reward those who act irresponsibly, whether they are big banks or  
small borrowers,” and noted that there had been “rampant speculation”  
by both lenders and borrowers who had expected the values of homes to  
keep rising.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/11/washington/10cnd-mccain.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin