Pop-up Double Talk: Ole Miss Debate

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more about “Pop-up Double Talk: Ole Miss Debate“, posted with vodpod

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Used with permission, thanks Jake.

Pop-up Double Talk

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Wasteful Spending & Earmarks

McCain Tonight: “We have to cut spending. I have fought to cut spending. Senator Obama has $800 billion dollars in new spending programs. I would suggest we start by canceling some of those new spending programs that he has. We can, I think, adjust spending around to take care of the very much needed programs, including taking care of our veterans. But I also want to say again, a healthy economy with low taxes with not raising anyone’s taxes, is probably the best recipe for eventually having our economy recover. And spending restraint has got to be a vital part of that. And the reason- one of the major reasons why we’re in the difficulties we’re in today is because spending got out of control. We owe China $500 billion dollars and spending, I know can be brought under control because I have fought against excessive spending my entire career and I got plans to reduce and eliminate unnecessary and wasteful spending. And if there’s anybody here who thinks there aren’t agencies of government where spending can be cut and their budgets slashed, they have not spent a lot of time in Washington.” [Presidential Debate, 9/26/08]

McCain Record:

McCain Voted To Spend $100 Million to Look For Extraterrestrial Life. In 1993, McCain voted to table an amendment that eliminated all funding for the search for extra-terrestrial intelligence program. The program was expected to cost $100 million over ten years. CQ described to vote as, “Mikulksi, D-Md., motion to table (kill) the Bryan, D-Nev., amendment to eliminate funding for the program to search for extraterrestrial intelligence.” The motion to table failed 23-77. [CQ, HR 2491, Vote #276, 9/22/93]

New York Times: McCain Got $3 Million for Road Project. In 2000, the New York Times reported, “Senator Robert C. Byrd, Democrat of West Virginia, and a number of Republicans who have been criticized by M r. McCain said he had also advanced his own wasteful projects in Arizona, including…$3 million for the Turquoise Trail, a joint effort of the Navajo and Hopi tribes.” [New York Times, 2/18/00] New York Times: McCain Got $56 Million for Project. In 2000, the New York Times reported, “Senator Robert C. Byrd, Democrat of West Virginia, and a number of Republicans who have been criticized by M r. McCain said he had also advanced his own wasteful projects in Arizona, including a $56 million authorization for an environmental and habitat restoration project along the Salt River.” [New York Times, 2/18/00]

New York Times: McCain Got $4.2 Million for Tucson Center. In 2000, the New York Times reported, “Senator Robert C. Byrd, Democrat of West Virginia, and a number of Republicans who have been criticized by M r. McCain said he had also advanced his own wasteful projects in Arizona, including…$4.2 million to create a national mediation center in Tucson.” [New York Times, 2/12/00]

1987: McCain Helped Secure $237 Million for CAP in FY 1988. In June 1987, the States News Service reported that McCain and other members of the Arizona Congressional Delegation “emerged from three days of intensive, closed-door negotiations Thursday to announce an agreement with environmental groups” to save hundreds of millions of dollars in funding for the Central Arizona Project. In September 1987, the States News Service reported, “The Senate Appropriations Committee Tuesday approved spending $237 million for the Central Arizona Project in fiscal 1988…Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., said in a press release, ‘This action indicates strong support for the CAP and portends favorable consideration by the full House and Senate.’” In 1987, the States News Service [Sates News Service, 6/18/87; States News Service, 9/15/87]

McCain Helped A Phoenix Space Lab Secure A $25 Million Grant From The Federal Government. While they were busy fighting off charges from the Keating Five scandal, Arizona Senators Dennis DeConcini and John McCain helped secure a $25 million federal contract for a space science lab in Phoenix. Senator DeConcini said, “There was the ability to sell it, to float it politically, that this was a good investment for America. I’m glad to have John McCain as a colleague to work for a $25 million contract because it was not just good for Arizona, because it was good for small business and good for the nation, a partnership of the private sector and the federal government.” [MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour, 1/22/90]

1992: McCain Requested $5 Million for Wastewater Treatment Plant. The Washington Post reported, “It turns out, McCain may not have always been so averse to earmarks.” The Post located a “1992 letter in which McCain privately pressed the Republican administration of President Bush’s father, George H.W. Bush, to secure a $5 million earmark for a wastewater project in Arizona after Congress had rejected the request in its own spending bill. Spurned by his colleagues, McCain took his case to the head of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. ‘I would like to request that EPA either re-program $5 million out of existing funds or earmark the amount from an appropriate account,’ McCain wrote in his Oct. 9, 1992 letter to then-EPA Administrator William K. Reilly, calling the earmark ‘crucial to protecting the public health and environment.’ Reilly wrote back a few months later – in the final days of the first Bush administration – saying his agency had ‘no options with which to fund this project.’” [Washington Post, 12/31/07]

McCain Proposed $10 Million for Law Center in Arizona. In December 2005, McCain introduced S. 2136, the William H. Rehnquist Center Act of 2005. The legislation would provide $10 million over five years to establish the William H. Rehnquist Center on Constitutional Structures and Judicial Independence at the University of Arizona James E. Rogers College of Law. The legislation was not voted upon. [S. 2136, William H. Rehnquist Center Act of 2005]

Roll Call Headline: “McCain Breaks Own Pork Rule.” In 2003, Roll Call reported, “McCain pushed for, and got, $14.3 million for Arizona’s Luke Air Force Base inserted into the just-completed fiscal 2004 military construction appropriations conference report.” Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman, who has battled with McCain for years over earmarks, said, “We don’t discriminate. … If he asked for it, we put it in.” [Roll Call, 11/6/03]

“Fair” Tax Plan

McCain Tonight: “You gotta look at our records. That’s the important thing. Who fought against wasteful and earmark spending? Who has been the person who has tried to keep spending under control? Who is the person who has believed that the best thing for America is to have a tax system that is fundamentally fair? And I’ve fought to simplify it and I have proposals to simplify it. Let’s give every American a choice: two tax brackets, generous dividends, and uh, two, let Americans choose whether they want they want.” [Presidential Debate, 9/26/08]

McCain Record:

McCain’s Plan: Tax Cuts To For Businesses. According to the Associated Press, John McCain proposed a long-term economic plan that would lower the corporate income tax rate and provide several other tax breaks for businesses. McCain proposed cutting the corporate tax rate to 25 percent from 35 percent. McCain said that his plan was “pro growth, less taxes and less spending” versus “the Democrats’ tired ideas of tax and spend.” [Associated Press, 1/17/08]

McCain’s Tax Plan Gives Top Five Oil Companies $3.8 Billion A Year In Tax Breaks. According to a study conducted by the Center for American Progress, “The McCain plan would deliver approximately $170 billion a year in tax cuts to corporations, including some corporations that are very large and profitable. Just one of the proposals—cutting the corporate rate from 35 percent to 25 percent—would cut taxes for five largest U.S. oil companies by $3.8 billion a year.” [Center for American Progress, 3/27/08]

Afghanistan

McCain Tonight: “First of all I won’t repeat the mistake that I regret enormously – and that is after we were able to help the Afghan freedom fighters and drive the Russians out of Afghanistan. We basically washed our hands of the region and the result over time was the Taliban, al-Qaeda, and a lot of the difficulties we are facing today. So we can’t ignore those lessons of history.” [Presidential Debate, 9/26/08]

McCain Record:

McCain: I’m Not As Concerned With Afghanistan, We May “Muddle” Through Afghanistan. After a speech to the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington D.C., McCain was asked about the deteriorating scenario in Afghanistan. He said, “There has been a rise in al Qaeda activity along the border. There has been some increase in U.S. casualties. I am concerned about it, but I’m not as concerned as I am about Iraq today, obviously, or I’d be talking about Afghanistan. But I believe that if Karzai can make the progress that he is making, that — in the long term, we may muddle through in Afghanistan.” [McCain Speech to the Council on Foreign Relations, 11/5/03; emphasis added]

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Barack Obama and John McCain Presidential Debate 09.26.08

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