(Map from http://electoral-vote.com)

I don't know how much uglier it gets than this.

The count for McCain (all red-shaded states) is 185.  To win he must flip all of the blue-bordered and light blue states.  If he misses any of them - any - he loses.  Flipping all of them gets McCain 274 EVs, but the lowest-count state in the game here is worth 5 EVs (Nevada), which means there are no losses that can be sustained.  Further, if he loses just one of the "barely republican" states other than Montana or North Dakota, nothing else matters.

The game is over John.  While technically this race is winnable, were I a bookmaker I'd give you 20:1 odds against.

McCain is not being helped at all by Congressional "screeching" about the bailout.  Barney Fife, er, Frank joined the chorus claiming that spending bailout money on bonuses was "illegal"; with luck Barney will find out all about illegal in the coming weeks and months as the FBI is now all over the mortgage mess, and perhaps they will see fit to investigate his homosexual relationship with a former Fannie Mae executive.  Yeah, it was a long time ago, but the seeds of this mess were sown a long time ago too - perhaps quite literally.

I point out Barney's "sausage hiding" episode specifically to illustrate that there is no partisan measure here in this mess.  Both sides of the aisle are to blame here, and those who think this is purely a Republican confab are simply full of crap. 

Both political parties are doing their damnedest to try to pin this mess on the other side, and that attempt will continue.  The American people are almost certain to vote out the Republicans in the White House and by extension the entire executive (including Treasury), which is certainly appropriate given the fact that Hank Paulson works for Bush and pocketed $500 million tax free creating and distributing this trash MBS paper before going to work for the White House.

Let's look at what Fox News reported back in 2006:

"Last year, the Goldman Sachs group said it paid Paulson $30 million in total compensation in 2004 — almost a 40 percent gain from the year before.

The administration hopes that Wall Street executive can make a better case to promote Bush's positive economic accomplishments of low unemployment and growth. In the Rose Garden announcement, Bush noted that the U.S. economy grew last quarter at an annual rate of 5.3 percent, the unemployment rate is at a low 4.7 percent, productivity is high and wages grew at an annual rate of 5.7 percent in the first quarter of this year.

"The American economy is powerful, productive and prosperous, and I look forward to working with Hank Paulson to keep it that way. As treasury secretary, Hank will be my principal adviser on the broad range of domestic and international economic issues that affect the well-being of all Americans," Bush said.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke praised Snow for his "years of dedicated and able service" and said that he looked forward to working with Paulson, described by Bernanke as "highly respected throughout the financial world," according to a statement.

Sen. Charles Schumer, a Democratic member of the Senate Finance and Banking Committee that will hold Paulson's confirmation hearing, said he spoke with Paulson and offered support for his nomination.

"His experience, intelligence and deep understanding of national and global economic issues make him the best pick America could have hoped for," Schumer said in a written statement."

Funny how a couple of years changes things, isn't it?

We now know, of course, that unemployment and GDP growth were both intentionally manipulated by Ponzi-style financial schemes of which our vaunted Treasury Secretary was instrumental in devising and executing, and that he created a personal fortune of $500 million dollars doing so.  We also know that he was permitted to cash that out without paying a nickel in tax as a consequence of taking the Treasury post.

One is obliged to ask - does Secretary Paulson know how to do math? 

Because if he does then it is only reasonable to assume that he was fully aware of how close this bubble was to bursting and that it was utterly unsustainable, and yet he said exactly nothing to The American People or Congress about it until it blew up in all of our faces.

With the FBI now crawling all over this mess (better late than never!) it will be quite interesting to see who gets pardoned on January 19th. 

I'm willing to bet the list is long and distinguished.