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Edited on Mon Oct-13-08 08:15 PM by NoMoreLurking
Obama calls for 90-day foreclosure moratorium
WASHINGTON - Democrat Barack Obama, bidding to extend his lead in the polls, proposed Monday to put home foreclosures on hold and give tax breaks to businesses that create jobs, while Republican opponent John McCain issued veiled but stinging criticism of the Bush administration.
With the U.S. economy threatened with an extended and deep recession, both candidates were mining deep anxieties among voters who watched helplessly last week as the stock market plunged nearly 20 percent, wiping away billions of dollars in retirement savings. Tens of thousands of Americans already have lost their homes to foreclosures and unemployment continues to climb.
Speaking in Toledo, Ohio, Obama laid out four new proposals that included a 90-day moratorium on home foreclosures by some banks, a $3,000 tax credit for each new job created, as well as a plan to let voters withdraw without tax penalties up to 15 percent, to a maximum of $10,000, from their retirement savings plans through the end of next year.
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The Democrat's four-point proposal included a special federal fund that would lend to state and city governments as the economy contracts and local tax revenues shrink.
Obama said that banks participating in the $700 billion Wall Street bailout plan should temporarily postpone foreclosures for families making good-faith efforts to pay their mortgage.
"We need to give people the breathing room they need to get back on their feet," he said, adding that families living beyond their means share some of the responsibility.
McCain distances himself from the president
McCain, meanwhile, ticked off economic plans he has detailed over the past two weeks and told an audience in Virginia that the country could not bear up under four more years like the past eight, implicitly criticizing fellow Republican President George W. Bush, whose unpopularity has been a huge drag on the veteran Arizona senator's campaign.
"We cannot spend the next four years as we have spent much of the last eight: waiting for our luck to change. The hour is late; our troubles are getting worse; our enemies watch. We have to act immediately. We have to change direction now. We have to fight," he said at the rally in Virginia, a normally reliably Republican state that he's been forced to defend this year as the economic crisis deepens.
Obama was playing to his strength as increasing numbers of voters are lining up behind him as the candidate they believe can best pull the U.S. economy out of the deep hole brought on by the near collapse of the country's financial structures.
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