The McCain camp was just quoted on NPR News as saying that, although McCain is generally against regulation, he is in favor of it "when it's truly needed."  Huh? 

As I've <a href = http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/talk/2008/09/the-market-collapse-was-the-go.php>argued</a href>, bust is an integral part of the unrestrained free-market that Republicans have been pushing since at least 1980.  Thus, their natural response to the current woes ought to be "so?  This is the way it is supposed to work.  Suck it up!"  Thus, in a down market, they shouldn't be rushing to regulation; they should be telling people to hold on for a wild ride.

Liberals, on the other hand, think the market functions better when regulated so that the highs are lower and the lows are higher.  (I recognize that, rhetoric aside, this is largely a difference of degree not kind; I'm no Marxist, but I don't subscribe to the Chicago school either.)

But whatever your world view, I can see no principled reason why it should change based on the market.  Unless you are willing to say you've been proven wrong and reform your ways, the ups and downs of the market should not change your fundamental view of how markets ought to be regulated.  Markets go up and down, so if you have a coherent theory, it should take account for that.

That's why the McCain camp's comment struck me.  If McCain or his advisors had a coherent model, it would not fundamentally change now that the market is down.  They would just be telling you to hang on (which is what I understood McCain's "fundamentals" refrain to mean).  For his part, Obama was for regulation even when the market was up because his model told him to be weary of the downside as investing and borrowing got out of hand.  But McCain's model, apparently, shifts based on the market.  He wants no regulation when it's up; he wants regulation it's down.  And that exposes his model's greatest weakness:  he doesn't have one; he's just guessing.