Senator McCain Requests Debate Delay

"A stage, an audience, a moderator, and at least one presidential candidate."
Robert Gibbs, Obama campaign spokesman, quoted in The Washington Post, on what to expect at Friday's scheduled debate.

Senator John McCain, who has missed voting on 412 bills in the current session of the Senate, wants to delay Friday's presidential debate and meet, along with Senator Obama, with leaders of both Houses of Congress to work on a solution to the financial crisis. Among the 64.1% of floor votes Sen. McCain missed were the F.I.S.A. Amendments Act, 2 energy development funding amendments, and a bill to fund military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as increase education benefits for certain veterans who served after September 11, 2001 (G.I. Bill).

Senator Barack Obama, who missed 295 votes, many of them during a prolonged primary contest with Sen. Hillary Clinton, has rejected the proposal to delay the debate.

The Trail, A Daily Diary of Campaign 2008 in The Washington Post also reports that the Commission on Presidential Debates said that it is "moving forward with its plan for the first presidential debate at the University of Mississippi in Oxford, MS, this Friday, September 26," despite the McCain announcement. "We believe the public will be well served by having all of the debates go forward as scheduled," the Commission said.


Update: Marc Ambinder of The Atlantic reports that "A senior (McCain) campaign official says that McCain will NOT debate -- no matter what -- if Congress hasn't reached an agreement on a bailout package."

Chris Cillizza opines in The Washington Post that "The move is an obvious attempt by McCain and his campaign to paint the Arizona senator as above politics, willing to put aside his campaign for the good of the country."