From the earliest records we have of his behavior, John McCain has been erratic, irresponsible, reckless and self serving. His recklessness got him shot down and he paid a terrible price, but it did not change him. His sleaziest behavior has been post Vietnam (adultery, abandoning his first wife and children, the Keating affair, his current campaign). He is still reckless, irresponsible and self serving. Witness his choice of Sarah Palin that suggests disloyalty to the country. Witness that most of his campaign ads are lies. Notice that he is still calling for business tax breaks while saying he is for change. Notice his deception with his medical records. Witness his "suspension" of his campaign and threats not to show for the first debate. (Unless I missed it, he never mentioned his "no show" threat at the debate.) Notice his non appearance on the David Letterman show, saying he had to get back to Washing to save the day, while he was, in truth, across the street taping an interview with Katie Couric.

It is a disgrace that we have come to the point where this man could be elected president, but then we elected George W. Bush twice, so we know we're past shame.

The NY Times article does mention two half siblings that Mrs. McCain routinely denies. Like Senator McCain, Cindy's father abandoned an earlier family to marry Cindy's mother. He left all his wealth to Cindy. He had apparently provided his other children with some financial support before his death.

The article does not mention that Mrs. McCain has reportedly cut off her father's other children without a nickle after his death. If true (my source is an NPR story), she is not only real rich, she is real mean. Of course, she is a Republican, so what else can you expect. Great first lady material.

All the figures anyone needs to analyze government economic policies of the post WWII years in the U.S. are in the historical tables of the Federal budget and available online.

I plotted the total Federal expenditures and total Federal taxes as a percentage of GDP over the years. It is highly instructive.

Prior to the Clinton years, the last time the Federal budget was in balance was 1969 with a budget that LBJ passed on to Nixon. Nixon immediately took it back into deficit.

Basically, while the numbers bounce around a little, the government was taxing 18% of GDP and spending 19% from 1947 to 1981. This worked pretty well. The Federal debt was still under one trillion dollars when Reagan was elected, and dropping as a percentage of GDP. Reagan did not cut taxes, but shifted the tax burden from wealthy Americans to middle and lower income Americans by lowering income tax rates and raising FICA taxes. What he really did was raise government spending to the highest levels seen after WWII. The Reagan years saw the debt go over four trillion dollars.

Clinton got the deficit under control and balanced the budget in his last years by both increasing revenue and cutting expenditures as a percentage of GDP. His success was made possible by an economic boom, but his policies were responsible, at least in part, for the boom.

Bush immediately took the budget back into deficit by cutting taxes for the rich. It was back in deficit prior to 9/11. Bush achieved the lowest revenue levels as a percentage of GDP seen in the post WWII period. He will have more than doubled the debt by the time he leaves office. The government spending that will be required to get us through the current economic disaster would not be a problem if we were not starting with a ten trillion dollar national debt.

Republicans have simply lied to the American people about "tax and spend liberals" for years, and voters, most of whom cannot comprehend numbers, have believed them. The Republican Party should not have survived the Great Depression that they brought on with policies similar to those we have seen since 1980. Maybe this time we will drive a stake through the elephant's heart.

Contrary to most opinions expressed about this article, I think it is important. Both John McCain and George W. Bush were the ill behaved, reckless, irresponsible sons of aristocratic families (McCain, the Navy; GWB, manufacturing and Wall Street).

Both have sold a story of conversion (Bush found Jesus and stopped drinking; McCain spent five plus years in Hell) and claimed to have been reborn. We know how it has worked out with GWB. I doubt McCain is any different. Why he gets a pass on character is amazing.

Even more important, both these men have successfully painted their opponents as "elitist". What a crock! People need to know the stuff in this story and who the real elitists are.

As a resident of Arkansas, I saw the lengths to which Republicans would go to destroy the Clintons and anyone they ever knew. The Obama team has to anticipate attacks on the new administration at every level, no matter how far fetched the charges. Republicans do not accept the legitimacy of the electoral process. I think the Obama team has to be as careful as they can, though it is certainly regrettable.

I would not have the nerve to disagree with Professor Krugman on matters economic, but I would take issue with his use of the word "ideology" to explain our present crisis. Ideology is what people say to justify policies that may be based on totally unrelated concerns. In this case, cutting taxes for rich people and refusing to regulate business was more a matter of letting people with money do exactly as they damn well pleased. They did, and look where it got us: exactly where the same policies of the same people got us in 1929.

The Republican Party should not have survived the Great Depression. Maybe this time, we can drive a stake through its heart.