...The challenges facing our financial system today are more
evidence that too many folks in Washington and on Wall Street weren’t
minding the store. Eight years of policies that have shredded consumer
protections, loosened oversight and regulation, and encouraged outsized
bonuses to CEOs while ignoring middle-class Americans have brought us to
the most serious financial crisis since the Great Depression.

I certainly don’t fault Senator McCain for these problems, but I do
fault the economic philosophy he subscribes to. It’s a philosophy we’ve
had for the last eight years – one that says we should give more and
more to those with the most and hope that prosperity trickles down to
everyone else. It’s a philosophy that says even common-sense regulations
are unnecessary and unwise, and one that says we should just stick our
heads in the sand and ignore economic problems until they spiral into
crises.

Well now, instead of prosperity trickling down, the pain has
trickled up – from the struggles of hardworking Americans on Main Street
to the largest firms of Wall Street.

This country can’t afford another four years of this failed
philosophy...

Barack Obama