Did you know John McCain invented the Blackberry? (Or... why I might start stuffing euros in my mattress.)

Yep, John McCain invented the Blackberry...shortly after Al Gore invented the internet.

The idiocy of the statement aside, that's the best example McCain's campaign could drum up to showcase his accomplishments on economic issues. The exchange between McCain's senior domestic policy advisor Douglas Holtz-Eakin and reporters today went something like this.

Reporters: What's McCain's plan for the economy and fixing the economic crisis?

Holtz-Eakin: “there’s no magic solution. And I don’t think that it’s at this moment imperative to write down exactly what the plan has to be.” A president isn’t someone who needs to be heavily involved in policy specifics, which should be handled by “quality” advisers. McCain himself has experience dealing with the economy, including his time on the Senate Commerce Committee.

Reporters: What is an example of something McCain accomplished on the Committee?

Holtz-Eakin: McCain didn't have jurisdiction over financial markets but (holding up his Blackberry), “He did this. Telecommunications of the United States, the premiere innovation in the past 15 years, comes right through the Commerce Committee. So you’re looking at the miracle that John McCain helped create, and that’s what he did. He both regulated and de-regulated the industry.”

So John McCain, who admits that he doesn't use or know how to use the internet or email, gets credit for the miracle of the Crackberry?

Kidding aside, I hope the losses incurred at Lehman and Merrill Lynch this week serve to show the voting public that the Republican motto of "it's not imperative to have a plan" with respect to the economy and financial markets is dead wrong.

McCain hasn't a clue.

The McCain camp has played this off as a joke by a "staffer" but the "senior domestic policy advisor" ain't no staffer. He's Douglas Holtz-Eakin, a PhD in Economics who was the director of the Congressional Budget Office, is a purported expert on world economics and was a senior economist on the President's Council of Economic Advisers under George H.W. Bush and the Chief Economist under George W. Bush.

No disrespect, Mr. Holtz-Eakin, but you suck at your job.

If you're the kind of "quality advisor" you think John McCain should rely on, we should all start stuffing euros in our mattresses.