Bush warns of "long and painful recession"

U.S. President George W. Bush delivers a nationally televised address from the White House to discuss a $700 billion financial rescue plan that he feels is needed to shore up the U.S. economy, in this frame grab taken in Washington on September 24, 2008. (Reuters/White House Television)

His dire warning came not long after the president issued extraordinary invitations to presidential candidates Barack Obama and John McCain, one of whom will inherit the mess in four months, as well as key congressional leaders to a White House meeting on Thursday to work on a compromise.

Okay, so either Bush is lying to us now or he was lying to us last week when he said the "fundamentals of the economy were sound." Of course, there is a third possibility - that he doesn't know what the hell he's talking about...