WASHINGTON (CNN) – President Bush said Friday that the U.S. government will continue to work to resolve the economic crisis, which he said is being made worse by anxiety and fear.
Watch: Anxiety worses crisis, Pres. Bush says
"Over the past few days, we have witnessed a startling drop in the stock market," he said in the Rose Garden. "Much of it is driven by uncertainty and fear."
He added, "We will continue to act and resolve this crisis."
(CNN) – President Bush may have issued an executive order Thursday creating a commission to ease presidential transition – but the process itself has been underway for months within both campaigns.
The White House has already been in contact with the presidential campaigns, though the first official meeting of the newly-created group - which will include officials from both Barack Obama and John McCain’s campaigns, along with administration representatives overseeing the nation’s fiscal health and national security - will take place next week.
Watch: Voters discuss which presidential candidate is best for the economy
Washington lobbyist William Timmons is in charge of McCain’s transition team, while John Podesta is in charge of Obama’s, whose efforts were underway before the parties’ conventions.
The last White House transition, delayed by the Florida recount, did not begin until late November.
(CNN) – Barack Obama held a campaign rally in Ohio earlier Friday, during which he discussed the economy.
"Now is not the time for fear. Now is not the time for panic," he will say, according to the prepared text. "Now is the time for resolve and steady leadership. We can meet this moment. We can come together to restore confidence in the American economy."
Read the prepared remarks
WASHINGTON (CNN) – President Bush has tried to strike an awkward balance between reassurance and reality about the nation's financial crisis. On Friday, he will do so again, but the repetition raises the question: to what effect?
Since September 15, the day financial giant Lehman Brothers failed, the president has commented on the nation's financial health 26 times, either through written, radio or on-camera statements.
White House Press Secretary Dana Perino says the president will let Americans know they "should be confident that every effort is being taken to stabilize our financial system."
Watch: Rescue plan will ' take a while,' Pres. Bush says
Perino announced the news after Thursday's astonishing 679-point drop in the Dow Jones Industrial Average, saying Bush would make his remarks "following the market's continued volatility this afternoon."
Perino also said Bush's speech at the White House Rose Garden is not expected to announce any policy decisions. In the past, Bush's statements have mostly been brief, as in Thursday's comments at the White House during a Hispanic Heritage Month celebration.
(CNN) – John McCain is facing a fresh round of anger from members of his own party deeply opposed to the Arizona senator's proposal for the federal government to purchase troubled mortgage loans.
he pointed backlash from several economic conservatives - many of whom already distrust McCain's commitment to free-market principles - couldn't come at a worse time for the Republican presidential nominee less than four weeks before Election Day as he stares at a significant deficit in national and state polls.
Watch: McCain mortgage plan has liberal roots
But at a time when McCain can't afford to worry about a lack of support from his party's base, several conservatives are openly criticizing the plan as a flagrant reward for reckless behavior among lenders.
Watch: Families react to McCain mortgage proposal
In a sharply worded editorial on its Web site Thursday, the editors of The National Review - an influential bastion of conservative thought - derided the plan as "creating a level of moral hazard that is unacceptable" and called it a "gift to lenders who abandoned any sense of prudence during the boom years."
CROWN POINT, Indiana (CNN) - More than 2,000 voter registration forms filed in northern Indiana's Lake County by a liberal activist group this week have turned out to be bogus, election officials said Thursday.
The group - the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN - already faces allegations of filing fraudulent voter registrations in Nevada and faces investigations in other states.
And in Lake County, home to the long-depressed steel town of Gary, the bipartisan Elections Board has stopped processing a stack of about 5,000 applications delivered just before the October 6 registration deadline after the first 2,100 turned out to be phony.
"All the signatures looked exactly the same," Ruthann Hoagland, a Republican on the board. "Everything on the card filled out looks exactly the same."
The forms included registrations submitted in the names of the dead - and in one case, the name of a fast-food restaurant, Jimmy Johns. Sally LaSota, a Democrat on the board, called the forms fraudulent and said whoever filed them broke the law.
(CNN) - A prominent surrogate for John McCain on Thursday raised Barack Obama's admitted cocaine use as a teenager and said the Illinois senator should speak candidly about it to the American people.
Speaking to Dennis Miller, a comedian and conservative radio talk show host, former Oklahoma Gov. Frank Keating said Obama should be more forthright about his background and what he called his "very extreme" record.
"He ought to admit, ‘You know, I've got to be honest with you. I was a guy of the street. I was way to the left. I used cocaine. I voted liberally, but I'm back at the center,'" Keating, a co-chair of McCain’s campaign, said Obama should tell voters. "I mean, I understand the big picture of America. But he hasn't done that."
An aide to John McCain said Keating was not directed by the campaign to make the comments.
"We didn’t ask him to do it,” the aide said. “He didn’t clear it with us, but obviously he’s read Senator Obama’s books.”
The Obama campaign has not responded to the comments.
The remarks ring similar to comments made by prominent New Hampshire Democrat Bill Shaheen, a Hillary Clinton supporter, during the primary. Shaheen, who predicted in December that Obama’s drug past would be a major Republican talking point if her were the Democratic nominee. He later apologized for the comments, but stepped down from his role in the Clinton campaign. Black Entertainment Television founder Bob Johnson, another Hillary Clinton backer, also had to apologize after making overt references to Obama's drug use at campaign rally in South Carolina.
In Obama's 1995 book Dreams of My Father, he writes that he was once headed in the direction of a "junkie" and a "pothead. Referring to his emotional struggles as a young man, Obama writes, "Pot had helped, and booze; maybe a little blow when you could afford it. Not smack, though."
Obama did speak during his primary campaign about his past experimentation with drugs and alcohol in high school.
"I made some bad decisions that I've actually written about," he told New Hampshire high school students last November. "There were times when I, you know, got into drinking, experimented with drugs. There was a whole stretch of time where I didn't really apply myself a lot."
CNN: Thousands of voter registration forms faked, officials say
More than 2,000 voter registration forms filed in northern Indiana's Lake County by a liberal activist group this week have turned out to be bogus, election officials said Thursday.
AP: Palin pre-empts state report, clears self in probe
Trying to head off a potentially embarrassing state ethics report on GOP vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin, campaign officials released their own report Thursday that clears her of any wrongdoing.
Washington Post: PR Consultant Helped Palin Grab Spotlight
During her first months in office, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin kept a relatively light schedule on her workdays in Juneau, making ceremonial appearances at sports events and funerals, meeting with state lawmakers, and conducting interviews with Alaska magazines, radio stations and newspapers.
Washington Post: Anger Is Crowd's Overarching Emotion at McCain Rally
There were shouts of "Nobama" and "Socialist" at the mention of the Democratic presidential nominee. There were boos, middle fingers turned up and thumbs turned down as a media caravan moved through the crowd Thursday for a midday town hall gathering featuring John McCain and Sarah Palin
Washington Post: Candidates Spar Over McCain Plan for Loans
Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama on Thursday said rival John McCain's mortgage rescue plan "punishes" taxpayers and rewards lending institutions that created the crisis, while McCain charged that his opponent's response showed a lack of concern
for homeowners.
CNN Radio: The words and the crowds get ugly
Barack Obama takes a page from Ross Perot, both presidential candidates ramp up the attacks, and the crowds are getting restless. Lisa Desjardins has today's CNN Radio Political Ticker.
* Sen. John McCain campaigns in La Crosse, WI
* Gov. Sarah Palin campaigns in Cincinnati, OH
* Sen. Barack Obama campaigns in Columbus, OH
* Sen. Joe Biden campaigns in Springfield, MO
From CNN Politics
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