Anyone elected as leader of the free world should be able to concentrate on more than one thing at the time. So why has John McCain announced that he will suspend his campaign and return to Washington D.C to deal with the economy? Is this some desperate attempt to avoid Friday’s debate with Barack Obama (who is leading in the polls)? Is McCain trying to use his ‘I’m soon to be President-elect’ so I should be where the action is?

Barack Obama wants the debate this Friday to go on. In a statement he said that it is important for the American people to be able to listen to what the two people who will lead their country and their economy in the next four to eight years have to say about the crisis. What they agree on and what they disagree on. And that whoever gets elected should and must be able to tackle more than one challenging issue at the time.

This is called multitasking, and is an important skill to have as President of the United States.

The experts are divided on McCain’s actions. Dick Morris thinks it is genius; McCain flies in to D.C, makes a speech and saves the day and then flies back to Mississippi and can bask in the glory during the debate, having proved to be a man of action and the best man for the job. Or, in Karl Rove’s view, McCain is chickening out of a debate after having lost to Obama the last few days on the issue of the economy. If he can’t even get his own party members to agree, it can have dire consequences for him and the Republican party.