The past few weeks have seen John McCain make a number of claims that are misleading or outright lies.
First, his campaign tried to push the idea that Barack Obama canceled a visit to military hospitals in Germany to thank service members for their sacrifice during an overseas trip last month because he could not bring the media.
After number of media outlets, such as the Washington Post, reported the truth that the Pentagon informed the Obama campaign that the visit would be viewed as a campaign event and therefore should not be done, the McCain camp continued to insist on their version of the story.
Although the hospital visit was initially approved, Andrea Mitchell of NBC reported, there were hints that McCain advisers with ties to some top military officials pressed the Pentagon to raise the political question and prevent the visit. The McCain people then turned around and falsely accused Obama of not wanting to visit the troops.
More recently the McCain campaign has aired TV ads claiming to promote energy independence, with whirling wind generators in the background, and charging Obama with planning to raise taxes.
But as TPM Election Central reported earlier this week, John McCain's record on energy policy is stunningly opposite to his claim. In the Senate, McCain opposed tax breaks to develop the wind power industry and alternative fuel additives like ethanol, even has he proposed billions in new tax breaks for Big Oil.
According to TPM Election Central, 'McCain recently opposed the big $300 billion farm bill, which itself is extremely popular throughout the upper midwest, describing the bill as 'a $300 billion, bloated, pork-barrel-laden bill' because of subsidies for industries like ethanol.'
Even further, the post adds, 'the bill also contained a measure extending a tax break for developing wind power, which McCain specifically opposed.'
Wind power is a growing industry that already employs 50,000 people, many of them living in key midwestern states like Iowa and Michigan, and creates electricity that does not rely on greenhouse emitting fossil fuels that cause global warming. With serious investment, new jobs would be created and wind could become a reliable source of clean energy, as the Obama campaign has proposed.
On top of that, The Carpet Bagger Report, in a post this week titled 'Big Oil vs. Little Wind,' also showed that McCain opposes another bi-partisan bill now making its way through the Senate that would provide some resources for clean energy alternatives like wind power, R&D for new alternatives, tax breaks for production of hybrid vehicles, and even allows some new offshore drilling, which McCain wants to prioritize.
Though he views new drilling as incapable of resupplying US energy needs or reducing gasoline prices, Obama has expressed support for the bill saying, 'I don't want the perfect to become the enemy of the good.'
According to The Carpet Bagger report, McCain doesn't like this compromise measure solely because it would remove tax breaks for Big Oil.
On the issue of taxes, campaign watchdogs again took McCain to task for misleading the public about Obama's plan to cut taxes for working families. In his TV spots, McCain claimed that Obama wants to 'raise your taxes' and falsely stated the tax burden would fall on middle-income families.
In its analysis of several McCain ads, said they continue 'McCain's pattern of misrepresenting Sen. Barack Obama's tax proposals as falling on middle-income families.'
A recent comparison by the non-partisan Tax Policy Center also breaks down the two candidate's plans by income bracket. According to the analysis, McCain's plan continues the Bush administration policy of providing the most tax breaks for the wealthiest people who need relief the least.
On the other hand, Obama's tax policy would provide direct relief of between $567 and almost $2,800 to all working families from the lowest income brackets up to $227,000 per year, with families in the middle receiving a tax break of roughly $1,000. Millionaires would pay more in taxes under an Obama administration, the Tax Policy Center analysis showed. Unless John McCain thinks people earning around $1 million a year are 'middle income families,' his ad is blatantly false.
Further, as Obama campaign Economic Policy Director Jason Berman pointed out in a teleconference with reporters this week, McCain's health care policy proposal would impose a $3.16 trillion tax increase on working families by taxing their employee health benefits. 'Millions of middle-class families would see their taxes go up under Senator McCain's plan,' Berman said.
So far the McCain campaign has not disputed Berman's comment on McCain's health care tax.
McCain needs to stop lying and give the voters some 'straight talk': that he favors a new health care tax and giving Bush-style tax breaks for the rich and Big Oil first.
