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New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson (D) tipped actor Val Kilmer to make a run to succeed him in 2010.

"I like the idea," Richardson said about a Kilmer bid, reports People magazine. "Val Kilmer is a New Mexican, he was Batman. You know there have been successful actors going into politics."

Kilmer, known for his work as Batman and in "Top Gun," said he was considering a run in January. The election is 2010.

Richardson added that he hasn't talked to Kilmer about a campaign. "I don't know how serious he is, but you know if he jumps in a race he's got name ID, so it can't be discounted," Richardson said.

Kilmer isn't registered with a party, reports the Associated Press. He appeared at a rally for independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader last month, according to Nader's website.

John McCain adviser Carly Fiorina said Tuesday that if Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R) was called upon to run Hewlett Packard, as Fiorina did, the Alaska Republican wouldn't be ready.

"Do you think [Palin] has the experience to run a major company, like Hewlett Packard?" Fiorina was asked on a St. Louis radio show.

"No, I don't," Fiorina said without further explanation.

"I would just remind you that it is Barack Obama who is running for president," Fiorina said. "Sarah Palin has more experience than Barack Obama has."

"I find it quite stunning actually that the Barack Obama campaign is questioning Sarah Palin's experience," the McCain adviser added. "She has more executive experience than he does and she is the vice presidential nominee and he is the presidential nominee."

Listen to the audio here.

A day after John McCain said that the economy's fundamentals are "strong," the Republican said Tuesday that the country has a "bad economy," reports The Page.

"It is a bad economy," McCain said during a campaign event in Tampa, Fla.

McCain, according to prepared remarks, also railed against the excesses of Wall Street and called for regulations that would make financial firms' dealings more transparent.

"In short order, we are going put an end to the reckless conduct, corruption, and unbridled greed that have caused a crisis on Wall Street," McCain said.

He added: "Under my reforms, the American people will be protected by comprehensive regulations that will apply the rules and enforce them to the full. There will be constant access to the books and accounts of our banks and other financial institutions. By law, it will reduce the debt and risk that any bank can take on. And above all, I promise reforms to prevent the kind of wild speculation that can put our markets at risk, and has already inflicted such enormous damage across our economy."

Like Barack Obama did during his own speech Tuesday on the financial markets, McCain touted his previous calls for reform. He said that he raised questions years ago about Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, the failing mortgage firms seized by the government last week.

But though McCain has long been a supporter of deregulation, he decried the lax oversight of Wall Street.

"Too many firms on Wall Street have been able to count on casual oversight by regulatory agencies in Washington," he said. "And there are so many of those regulators that the responsibility for oversight is scattered, unfocussed and ineffective... But for all their big and impressive sounding names, the fact is they haven't been doing their job right, or else we wouldn't have these massive problems on Wall Street. At their worse, they've been caught up in Washington turf wars instead of working together to protect investors and the public interests. And we don't need a dozen federal agencies doing the job badly -- we need the best federal agencies to do the job right."

Barack Obama extended his argument Tuesday that John McCain can't fix the economy, linking the Republican's remark about a fundamentally strong economy to his support for deregulation.

Obama, in a speech in Golden, Colo., said that the current crisis, in which investment banks are failing and mortgage companies have been seized by the government, partly stems from a failed economic policy that favors the deregulation of markets that favors lobbyists and "those with the most" over consumres. He added that McCain, like President Bush, has bought into that philosophy.

"This is what happens when you confuse the free market with a free license to let special interests take whatever they can get, however they can get it," Obama said. "This is what happens when you see seven years of incomes falling for the average worker while Wall Street is booming, and declare

Olympic swimming champion Ryan Lochte toured the Capitol Tuesday to meet with some of the most powerful members of Congress to push a bill on muscular dystrophy.

He effused a manner of cool and calm about the power of the lawmakers with whom he was meeting. "Should be painless and fun," he said Tuesday morning of his upcoming meeting with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).

Having just emerged from meeting with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), he was asked how it went.

"Oh, really good," the 24-year-old said. "I just liked being in the presence of him."

The bill Lochte is helping to push is the Paul Wellstone Muscular Dystrophy Care Act. It is part of a reauthorization bill that is expected to be marked up tomorrow in the House Energy and Commerce Committee. The bill is then expected to be voted on as part of a suspension package next week. In Lochte

Barack Obama's campaign is ridiculing John McCain spokesman Doug Holtz-Eakin for claiming Tuesday that the BlackBerry is "the miracle that John McCain helped create."

"If John McCain hadn't said that 'the fundamentals of our economy are strong' on the day of one of our nation's worst financial crises, the claim that he invented the BlackBerry would have been the most preposterous thing said all week," Obama spokesman Bill Burton said in a statement.

Holding up his BlackBerry this morning, Holtz-Eakin told reporters, "he did this."

"Telecommunications of the United States is a premier innovation in the past 15 years, comes right through the Commerce committee so you're looking at the miracle John McCain helped create and that's what he did."

Polls this month reveal a tightening presidential race in New Jersey, a state many assumed would fall easily into Barack Obama's column come November.

Obama leads John McCain there by three percentage points, Marist College and Quinnipiac University report in polls taken during the first and second weeks of September, respectively. Major polls showed Obama leading there by 10 percentage points at the beginning of August.

Other polls show Obama performing better in New Jersey--a recent Research 2000 survey, for instance, shows him up by nine percentage points--but RealClearPolitics' average of recent major polls reports the Illinois Democrat as leading by 5.3 percentage points, his lowest advantage in RealClearPolitics' average since Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) suspended her primary campaign in June.

New Jersey has voted overwhelmingly Democratic in recent presidential elections. Its 15 electoral votes place it on par with North Carolina and Georgia in terms of election-night value.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) announced an agreement Tuesday over a long-stalled package of tax breaks for individuals and businesses.

"I think there is an agreement between the Republican leader and me," Reid said on the floor Tuesday morning. "That's a great pattern for what we need to do here."

The business community has long pushed for the package of tax breaks, but it has been stalled over a dispute over whether the loss in revenue from the tax breaks should be offset by new tax increases.

Details on the deal have not yet been released.

-Manu Raju