ObamaGötterdämmerung

Well, the final Obama/McCain debate is over. And I'm afraid it's over.

All Barry had to do was stick to his talking points and not yawn. He's succeeding in running out the clock.

McCain had already blown the second debate by not confronting Obama on his well-worn canards, like "95% of people making less than $200,000 a year* will get a tax rebate."

Well, no. As any bright 16-year-old could have riposted,

40% of Americans don't pay any income tax. If Mr. Obama sends them a check, it's not a rebate. It's opening the vault door of the Treasury and shoveling money out with a grain scoop. If you work hard and pay taxes, do you want those dollars (and those of your children and grandchildren) spent to mail checks to people who never pay taxes?

This time around, to capture the mood of the American people, McCain should have recalled the movie Network, in which Peter Finch as Howard Beale famously shouted, "I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take it anymore!"

Not that this is a unique idea. O'Reilly and Dick Morris have preached this for several weeks. Surely someone among McCain's advisors must have a television set.

But too many of his handlers want to keep John tamped down and docile, so as to pander to independents, who are perceived as people having been born without a spine.

I submit McCain could reverse the poll numbers overnight if he'd have said

If I'm elected, the first thing I'm going to do is appoint a Special Prosecutor to bring to justice the people who made this financial mess. This was partly through government interference that forced lenders to give mortgages to people who couldn't afford them.

That includes Democrats and Republicans, but especially Barney Frank and Christopher Dodd. And there'll be special attention for those who got huge political contributions from corrupted lending organizations.

Actually, that would include you, Senator Obama, since you got the second-highest Freddie Mac wad of hush money. You didn't quite catch up to Chris Dodd this time, and I'm promising there won't be a next time.

And as for those snot-nosed Wall Street shysters who packaged and peddled these sub-prime instruments that stank like Gorgonzola cheese, you can expect some perp-walks. That's where miscreants are led into courtrooms wearing manacles and leg irons, which is my idea of humane treatment.

Afterwards, I want them wearing orange jumpsuits, being led off to prison. And none of those white-collar prisons with maid service. I want them to serve hard time, where they get a 250-pound weightlifter for a cellmate who takes one look and says, "You got a purty mouth."

Thank you and good night.

*Sometimes expressed by Obama as "$250,000 a year," sometimes as "middle class." The specifics change with the barometric pressure, as near as I can tell.

Götterdämmerung being a translation into German of the Old Norse phrase Ragnarök, which in Norse mythology refers to a prophesied war of the gods which brings about the end of the world.