Is there any excuse for McCain's gaffe?

Consider: The United States needs to create about 150,000 jobs per month just to keep pace with growing population. When payroll jobs fall for eight straight months and the unemployment rate spikes, and when new weekly unemployment claims remain above 400,000, the economy may not be fundamentally sound.

When inflation in the past 12 months has run at 5.4 percent, well over twice the level with which central bankers are comfortable, the economy may not be fundamentally sound.

When foreclosures are running at record rates and housing prices fall by nearly 16 percent year over year, the economy may not be fundamentally sound.

When the two largest financial institutions in the nation, which guarantee about half of the mortgages, fail and have to be taken over by the government, when the fourth-largest investment bank files for Chapter 11, and when the Federal Reserve effectively nationalizes a massive insurance firm that is a component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average, the economy may not be fundamentally sound.

In an economy in which consumption constitutes 70 percent of activity, retail sales falling two months in a row may indicate that the economy might not be fundamentally sound.

When industrial production decreases, the economy may not be fundamentally sound.