After weeks of negative campaigning and mud-slinging, John McCain made a stunning admission this week. During a presidential forum Sept. 11th, McCain said, "It's easy for me to go to Washington and, frankly, be somewhat divorced from the day-to-day challenges people have."
McCain's own words never more clearly highlighted the truth about his political record and his distance from middle-class families.
While pledging to recycle George W. Bush's economic policies of more tax breaks for corporations who move jobs out of the country and for corporate executives, John McCain refused to even mention in his convention speech that working families are faced with a five-year high in the unemployment rate, high inflation in food, energy and health care costs, and a home foreclosure epidemic of historic proportions.
John McCain rejected the 21st Century GI Bill, which provides expanded educational, job training, and medical benefits for veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. His surrogates called the benefits a "handout," and he described the benefits under the bill "too generous."
He has proposed privatizing Veterans Affairs hospital and medical care for veterans, characterizing guaranteed treatment for veterans as a "burden."
He helped block the reauthorization of the State Children Health Insurance Program, or S-CHIP,which would have provided health insurance for about 4 million uninsured children of working families who can't afford the high cost of insurance premiums.
He has called for a three-month "gas tax holiday" that would put literally several dollars into the pockets of gasoline consumers – but only if oil companies decided to pass the savings onto them.
He has repeatedly voted to block or kill investments in renewable alternative energy for the auto industry, for wind and solar power, and for clean coal. This, while working families want 5 million new jobs in the clean energy sector.
While working families have seen the public schools their children go to being forced to cut programs or to close their doors, John McCain has called for abolishing the Department of Education and gutting funding for public schools.
When asked by a reporter about the number of homes he owns, John McCain couldn't recall and said he'd have to get back to the reporter. Working families later learned that McCain owns at least seven homes valued at about $2 million each.
In explaining his refusal to support fair pay for women workers, John McCain said that women need more "education and experience" before they can expect equal pay, not understanding that women are the most educated segment of US society.
While he has claimed to favor tax relief for middle-class families, his top economics advisor, Doug Holtz-Eakin told a reporter that the next president will have to raise taxes. To prove it, John McCain is sneaking a new $3.6 trillion tax increase on middle-class families into his health care plan. So far most analysis of the tax plans of the two presidential candidates shows that Barack Obama's plan will provide the best relief for working families.
While nearly 7 in 10 Americans want the war in Iraq to end, John McCain has pledged a 100-year occupation and to "stay the course."
On trade policy, John McCain advocates for more "free trade" deals like NAFTA and fast-tracking them through Congress without much public scrutiny. He told a Midwestern audience during the Republican primary campaign that good-paying jobs will be lost and there wasn't much he planned to do about that.
His combined views on Iraq and NAFTA prompted one conservative TV commentator to say John McCain is running on a platform of "less jobs and more war."
After weeks of using distortions and open lies to attack Barack Obama, John McCain got one thing right: it is easy for him to be divorced from the challenges working families face.
