Monday Morning: Bailout Package Moves to the House; Will the Candidates Vote On It?; and VP Nominees Get the Full Nina

Good morning, folks! It's a beautiful fall day in Washington, and we are looking forward to drying out after gray skies -- and two inches of rain -- since Thursday.

The House and Senate leadership appear to have reached an agreement on an economic bailout package over the weekend (despite House Republican Leader John Boehner reportedly calling the bill a "crap sandwich" in a meeting with his caucus). If you are fluent in legislative language, you can give it a read here. If not, you may prefer to check out the WSJ's executive summary to help you sort out your feelings on the new and improved (and 107 pages longer than the original proposal!) bill.

The House is expected to vote on the package today -- but as NPR's David Welna reports, the bill's passage still isn't quite a done deal. The President and Secretary Paulson are urging hasty approval to prevent an economic collapse, but the bill remains extremely unpopular among the American public (at least according to some polls) -- and House members are all too aware that every single seat will be on the ballot in just over a month. As Kansas Democrat Nancy Boyda told David, "Mother said there'd be days like this, and she was right." If the House passes the bailout bill, it will reach the Senate mid-week. 35 Senate seats are up for grabs in November.

Both major-party presidential candidates seem to be leaning toward supporting the bailout, but Politico reports that neither campaign will commit to having its candidate make the trip to DC for the vote on the package. (That article also notes that if the candidates do make the trip to the Capitol, it will be Obama's first vote since July 9th, and McCain's first since March 14th. Those stats via the WP Congress votes database -- though other sources, including the WP itself, cite McCain's most recent vote as April 8th.)

The candidates are both still surfing the spin wave after Friday's debate at Ole Miss. In the absence of any memorable zingers, mess-ups, or obvious dominance by either candidate, many pundits had ruled the debate a toss-up. But new LA Times/Bloomberg numbers appear to give Obama a slight polling edge coming out of the debate, with McCain still endeavoring to explain his confusing campaign quasi-suspension last week.

And finally, don't miss our own Nina Totenberg's profile of Joe Biden from today's Morning Edition. Nina's look at Sarah Palin will air tomorrow morning. Consider those two pieces your listening homework before the VP nominees meet Thursday in a debate moderated by PBS's Gwen Ifill. And it promises to be an interesting one: according to ABC's Jake Tapper, the notoriously verbose Sen. Biden has been getting tips from female Senators about "how to debate women without seeming sexist or bullying."

-- Evie Stone

10:00 AM ET | 09-29-2008 | permalink

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