In Friday's televised debate between John McCain and Barack Obama, the candidates were pressed to say how the financial crisis and the proposed rescue scheme would affect their plans for government. The debate's moderator - Jim Lehrer of the Public Broadcasting Service, who gave a master class in that demanding craft - was courteous but persistent on the point, and got nowhere.

Mr McCain defaulted to a standard talking-point: the need to get a grip, without saying how, on public spending. He again underlined his opposition to earmarks (local spending projects tacked on to larger pieces of legislation). He is right that they are abusive, but they are small in relation to public spending as a whole. Spending bills in the current year included $17bn (€11.6bn, £9.2bn) in earmarks, compared with total outlays of about $3,000bn, and a deficit of roughly $400bn. The Treasury's Troubled Asset Relief Program (Tarp) envisages new outlays of $700bn.