Obama: McCain's Campaign Like an 'SNL' Routine

Before a crowd of roughly 14,000 residents of Las Vegas, Nev., sitting in the bleachers of Cashman Center -- home to the minor league baseball team the Las Vegas 51s -- Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., Wednesday evening continued to mock Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., as out of touch on the economy.

Proceeding through a litany of what he perceives to be McCain missteps, Obama mentioned that McCain had recently "bragged about how, as chairman of the Commerce Committee in the Senate, he had oversight of every part of the economy. Well, all I can say to Sen. McCain is nice job."

The audience laughed.

"Nice job!" Obama repeated, sarcasm dripping from his voice. "I mean, where is he getting these lines? The lobbyists running his campaign?

"You all remember Phil Gramm," Obama said, once again bringing up the former Texas senator and McCain friend whom McCain distanced himself from several months ago. "He says we’re just going through a mental recession and called the United States of America a nation of whiners. I’m not making this up. You can’t make this up. It’s like a 'Saturday Night Live' routine."

The crowd roared with approving laughter.

"So, then yesterday, Sen. McCain’s big solution to the crisis we’re facing is -- put on your seatbelts -- a commission," Obama said. "A commission! Well, that’s Washington-speak for 'We’ll get back to you later.'"

Trying not to project pessimism, even as he's labeled this current economic crisis the worst since the Great Depression, Obama insisted he has "every confidence that we can steer ourselves out of this crisis ... because that’s who we are, that’s what we’ve always done as Americans.

"But the one thing I do know is this: we can’t steer ourselves out of this crisis if we’re heading in the same disastrous direction," Obama said. '''We can’t steer ourselves out of this crisis using the same old map, we can’t steer ourselves out of the crisis if the new driver is getting directions from the old driver, and that’s what this election is all about."

-- Jake Tapper and Sunlen Miller