The American Spectator

McCain did a weird semi-back-off today on Chris Cox, saying that Cox is “a good man” — but then insisting that Cox still should resign. But again, he gave not a single specific, factual reason why. He just said the problems happened on Cox’s watch. Again, that shows ignorance: Cox can only do what he has statutory authority to do, and he does not have direct statutory authority to micromanage financial institutions — plus, his job elsewhere is merely to enforce the law and to stop rule-breaking, not to tell companies like AIG how to run their businesses. McCain did again complain about a lack of transparency on Wall Street, as if he still hasn’t been told that the one unambiguous triumph of Cox’s short tenure has been his successful effort — actually, multiple efforts — to improve transparency of corporate books, to levels never before seen on Wall Street. Again, McCain is utterly ignorant, but too headstrong to even bother learning basic facts about his chosen subject. His performance all week has been disgusting. Utterly disgusting. Actually, worse than that: contemptible.