McCain just announced that he will suspend his campaign tomorrow and return to Washington to work on the Wall Street bailout bill. He also proposed delaying Friday's foreign policy debate until a consensus is reached. Senator Obama reached out to McCain early this morning to see if he wanted to release a joint statement on their shared priorities. Apparently McCain returned his call at 2:30, then almost immediately came out and made the announcement.

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If I were the Obama campaign, I would agree to suspend campaign activities for the rest of the week, but demand that the debate continue as scheduled, with the topic switched to economic matters. The American people deserve to hear the candidates lay out their visions for America.

Ben Smith gets it:

Both candidates have been marginal players; McCain, though, seems to have the potential to make himself a major one, and his move is a mark, most of all, that he doesn't like the way this campaign is going.

But in terms of the timing of this move: The only thing that's changed in the last 48 hours is the public polling.

Nicole adds:

This must be a VERY important crisis if it requires the full, undivided attention of a Senator who has missed 230 out of 286 votes since Q4-2007. That's 80% of those votes he's missed.

And he doesn't even sit on any committees that matter.