Politics | John McCain Experts Deride McCain’s Mortgage Crisis Fix Current woes not comparable to '01 factors that prompted GM to offer 0% financing By Jonas Oransky Posted Mar 26, 2008 12:52 PM CDT Copied Republican presidential candidate, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., speaks at a small business owners roundtable, Tuesday, March 25, 2008, at C & H Letterpress, Inc. in Santa Ana, Calif. (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer) Economists, and rivals, are scoffing at John McCain’s ideas for countering the nation’s foreclosure crisis, taking aim at the suggestion that top lenders follow the post-9/11 example of General Motors—which offered 0% financing on new cars. But experts note that GM had its own interests in mind—not the country’s—in selling off excess inventory, the New York Sun reports. Hillary Clinton, who earlier detailed a complex rescue plan of her own, said of McCain’s hands-off outlook, “It sounds remarkably like Herbert Hoover.” Fellow Democrat Barack Obama agreed, calling it “deeply troubling” that the Republican wanted “to sit back and watch” the housing crisis happen. None of the presidential hopefuls, the Sun notes, defers entirely to the free market. Read These Next New York Times ranks the best movies of the 21st century. White House rolls with Trump's 'daddy' nickname. A man has been deported for kicking an airport customs beagle. New Fox star, 23, misses first day after car troubles. Report an error