Cone says his “guess is that voters will respond to Obama’s calm and focus and not to McCain’s angry, win-at-all-costs campaign,” while the N&R’s Rosemary Roberts says “McCain and Obama promised to take the high road in the presidential campaign, but McCain — via Palin — deliberately went off the rails.”

Funny, a lot of McCain followers have been walking around for three weeks now wondering exactly the hell when he’s gonna to get angry. His failure to hammer Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac is inexcusable and could very well cost him the election. I’ll refer you to the week-old (but two months too-late) NYT Times front-pager on Fannie:

Whenever competitors asked Congress to rein in the company, lawmakers were besieged with letters and phone calls from angry constituents, some orchestrated by Fannie itself. One automated phone call warned voters: “Your congressman is trying to make mortgages more expensive. Ask him why he opposes the American dream of home ownership.”

The ripple effect of Fannie’s plunge into riskier lending was profound. Fannie’s stamp of approval made shunned borrowers and complex loans more acceptable to other lenders, particularly small and less sophisticated banks.

Not angry enough? Reid Lawrence, the Winston-Salem housing authority director who pocketed HUD funds in the Lansing Ridge property-flipping scheme, was offered the choice of a $100,000 buyout or being fired. He took the buyout.

Again, this is government in the housing business. What do you think they’d do with the health care system?