McCain to boost and cut Pentagon spending at the same time
By Steve Benen Thursday Jun 12, 2008 6:30pm
It may seem hard to believe, but John McCain is actually intent on making Still-President Bush look fiscally responsible. Given that Bush has added trillions to the debt, run the largest deficits in U.S. history, and is the first president to ever put the costs of a war on the national charge card, that’s no small feat.
But McCain is giving it a shot anyway, most notably when it comes to tax cuts. He wants to take the Bush tax cuts (which McCain originally voted against) and make them permanent, on top of slashing the corporate income-tax rate from 35% to 25%. In all, according to the McCain campaign and the Congressional Budget Office, McCain’s plan would cost an additional $400 billion a year (at a time of already huge budget deficits), and at the same time, the senator has also vowed to balance the federal budget by the end of his first term.
The trick, of course, is figuring out how to pay for all of these new tax cuts. Originally, McCain said he could achieve this by eliminating earmarks. Ultimately, though, the campaign could only identify about $18 billion in cuts — which may sound like a lot, but pales in comparison to tax cuts with a $2 trillion price tag.
So, the McCain gang has rolled out rationalization #2.
McCain’s top economic adviser, Doug Holtz-Eakin, blithely supposes that cuts in defense spending could make up for reducing the corporate tax rate from 35% to 25% and the subsequent shrinkage in federal revenues. Get that? The national security candidate wants to cut spending on our national security. Wait until the generals and the admirals hear that.
Wait, McCain wants to cut the Pentagon budget? Since when?
Chris Bowers noted:
If true, this would be a much bigger bombshell that McCain’s remarks on Iraq withdrawal. Unlike Forbes, it isn’t the hypocrisy of being “tough” on national security while suggesting cuts in defense spending that would be a big deal. Instead, it would be a big deal because it has the potential to create a bi-partisan consensus in this election on the need to cut the defense budget in 2009.
Obama should jump all over this, and argue that if we are going to cut defense spending, it should not be to pay for a corporate tax break, but instead to invest in American infrastructure, health care, and a new energy economy. He should also argue that McCain won’t actually cut defense spending, because his refusal to withdraw from Iraq would make a reduction in defense spending impossible.
Quite right. McCain’s stated position is that he intends to increase the size of the military, while fighting indefinitely in Iraq. And he’s going to do this while slashing spending for the Defense Department? How’s that, exactly?
What’s more, while the McCain campaign is talking about the savings associated with cuts to the Pentagon budget, the same McCain campaign is talking about increasing the size of the Pentagon budget.
Along with more personnel, our military needs additional equipment in order to make up for its recent losses and modernize. We can partially offset some of this additional investment by cutting wasteful spending. But we can also afford to spend more on national defense, which currently consumes less than four cents of every dollar that our economy generates — far less than what we spent during the Cold War. We must also accelerate the transformation of our military, which is still configured to fight enemies that no longer exist.
As Matt Yglesias noted, “So on the one hand, defense cuts will pay for tax cuts. But on the other hand, we need to substantial increase defense spending as a share of GDP to something more like Cold War levels.”
I know there are some who consider McCain a credible, knowledgeable guy. I just can’t figure out why.
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Boost on the flip, cut on the flop.
He has a special deal with smilin' bob to get him a bunch of enzyte to thrill the corpse. Is this going to go on every day? He has contradicted himself once for each day of the week recently. It is getting humorous.
Well, at least he does not try to deny that he lies and flip-flops, I find that kind of honesty about refreshing!
Don't forget, he also recently said, he could produce a 100 billion dollars in a second. Printing presses in overdrive??? 100% lies. Tell people what they want to hear. NO substance
Yessirree...takes a real maverick to do that....
ah-k ah-k... you guys just dont get it..... i'll write slow so you can understand....
i'm gonna give the rich guys a tax break... and the middle class too... and the poor...
i'm gonna balance the budget, improve the infrastructure, whatever else i promised...
....ah ah ah.... here is my SECRET SOLUTION..... i'm gonna outsource the military to china....
hey... they got billions of extra people... we need them... at $2 a day, we can fire all the american soldiers, and still have enuf money left for christmas
........speaking of christmas.... i'm gonna save you money there too... you don't have to buy a fruitcake... just believe in one
Gregg @ 3:
I suppose demetia could be kind of charming, of you really tried to look at it that way. I, for one, don't.
Edwin Hussein @ 7:
On second thought, it's not dementia (though I believe that is part of it.) It's lies and pandering. Nothing refreshing about that. It's dishonesty, Bush style.
I figure he will just cut infrastructure spending. It makes sense, if you think about it. That there bridge isn't going to fall down in the next 4 years. That highway isn't going to disintegrate. Sure, you'll get the odd pothole here and there and maybe some rust and cracking and such, but the infrastructure can wait. We got wars to fight.
When you're a career soldier, every problem looks like a war.
Is this a sample of the new McMath our schools have been eagerly waiting for?
It must be tough for McSame's right side to keep up with what his left side is doing.
I just want this election to end. Bush and his cronies crippled this country. If people vote for McCain they are nuts. Even if The Democrats pick up more seats, If McCin wins we will look like fools before the world.
Why does McCain hate the troops?
How shameful and gutless that McSame would support or try to bolster the legacy of this pretend prez in any way. Wasn't GW the head of the machine that tried to besmirch McSame's family with allegations of his fathering a baby, excuse me not only a baby but a Black baby, as though that is the worst fortune that could befall a white man in this country. And this is the man who would make decisions for this country.
Geraldo @ 9:
When you're a career soldier, every problem looks like a war.
Geraldo, I think that you just hit the nail on the head!
Don't the neocons tell us that cutting taxes will actually increase revenue? You only need to look at the champion tax-cutters - Reagan and Chimpy - They cut taxes like nobody else in history. The increase in revenue also created the largest deficits in the history of mankind. What they forgot to tell us that the increased revenue comes from China, SA and other cash rich countries.
We need to disband the military. They are destroying America and making huge profits!!
Quit enlisting and giving them bodies to do their killing.
The US military is thoroughly corrupt organization and a huge threat to democracy!
It’s easy to see who is pulling McCain’s strings. It’s the same cynical bunch that has nothing but contempt for Americans, because they believe they can say anything they want. They are certain that we suffer from amnesia, or we are too stupid to put two and two together. Even Mr. John "The Opportunist" McCain wouldn’t have pulled such a cynical view of Americans out of his ass. No, this level of cynicism is callous, disrespectful, and void of any moral bearings what-so-ever. It’s the same gang that gave us Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and George W. Bush and we know that they could not care less about any of us. We are consumers and expendables. Our significance to them is similar to that held by a couple of African leaders who use child soldiers in the first wave to attack the enemy so that it wastes its ammunition on them.
What has bothered me for some time now is calling McCain a 'True American Hero'
Re:
1. a man of distinguished courage or ability, admired for his brave deeds and noble qualities.
2. a person who, in the opinion of others, has heroic qualities or has performed a heroic act and is regarded as a model or ideal: He was a local hero when he saved the drowning child.
3. the principal male character in a story, play, film, etc.
4. Classical Mythology.
a. a being of godlike prowess and beneficence who often came to be honored as a divinity.
b. (in the Homeric period) a warrior-chieftain of special strength, courage, or ability.
c. (in later antiquity) an immortal being; demigod.
5. hero sandwich.
6. the bread or roll used in making a hero sandwich.
I cannot imagine him fitting any of 1 thru 4. I have heard of nothing he ever did described as 'heroic', so I concluded when using the term 'hero' when describing McCain, they must be talking of either #5 or #6
McCain: Trying to be all things to all people .. and pleasing none.
TheRealMcCain.com
At this rate the GOP might not nominate him after all.
Really.
By selling Hawaii to the Chinese, we should be able to pay off the national debt. I hear the Chinese are great landlords.
Even all the GOP trickery will never get this man elected. They managed to get Dubya 'appointed' the first time, and the second time was stolen as well.
I don't see any possibility of Sen McCain being elected without "help"....be it DIEBOLD or some other method.
Jay Severin Has A Small Pen1s @ 23:
They're doing a helluva lot better helping the earthquake victims, than boosh did with the Katrina victims.
whatever they call it, it will be deficit spending.
I love Grandpa.
He makes me laugh...
Mccain't is'nt going anywhere with his mixed up thinking. It's back to the Senate and maybe even an old folks home in Arizona with you Gramps.
It's Magic folks. Vote McCopperfield and you can have it both ways .... Step right up to the BIG TOP Folks, two bits will get you any Lie you want.
McSame agrees withBush on everything. He say it here.
Hey, why are scrutinizing everything that I say?
You didn't care what George Bush said in 2000, or 2004.
John McCain(yet another senior moment)
you
Why not? After all, they cut taxes and raised revenue!
They transferred the tax burden on to the middle class and working poor in order to create a healthier more vibrant economy for all. And they deregulated everything; giving us the safest food and environmental conditions we have ever seen (not to mention that mortgage thing). Plus, don't forget their wisdom and foresight at successfully flooding the market with cheap oil after going into Iraq! These guys are freaking genuises.
Us poor stupid unwashed masses just don't understand how wonderful and straight forward all their policies are. Thank you and the entire GOP Senator McCain, for all your honesty and integrity in putting America on the RIGHT path.
it's hard to be for what you're against, unless you're mcAsshole.
not to worry your little head about it. his media whores are already tending to his crap.
When you get past the smell, you've got it licked.
look at any video of mcsame and you will see his head spinning around and around like Linda Blair in the exorcist.
jnratliff...maybe that explains why Gov Bobby Jindal is on his McCain's possible VP list being an exorcist and all.
As others noted during his 2003 and 2007 gubernatorial campaigns (see update), in an essay Jindal wrote in 1994 for the New Oxford Review, a serious right-wing Catholic journal, Jindal narrated a bizarre story of a personal encounter with a demon, in which he participated in an exorcism with a group of college friends. And not only did they cast out the supernatural spirit that had possessed his friend, Jindal wrote that he believes that their ritual may well have cured her cancer.
moonsha @ 35:
And the demon took up residence in McBush. Timing for the bizarre decline of McBush is about right. Coincidence?
All these comments and NO ONE points out that Obama told AIPAC that HE wants to "grow the military" too! I'm an Obama voter and supporter, but don't kid yourselves. He is NOT going to disband the military (make ME happy) and like as not, not ask for a reduction in monies the first year.
Come on, now. Don't be so filled with anti-McCain that you miss things you should be catching! Obama can't jump on McCain for this or he opens himself to flip-flop (the 2nd deadliest sin) charges of his own.
He was for the Pentagon before he was against it...
"Waste, Fraud, and Abuse", boys and girls. Bush drove this previously bogus item to new heights.
OK, if there are any Republicans in this thread; please answer me these 2 questions:
1) Did you vote for McCain in the primary?
2) If so, why?
McFlipFlop!
He's a tee pee
He's a wigwam
He's two tents!
Sounds like Bushenomics to me. What's a clone to do?
Someday McBush is going to end up castrating himself by straddling the fence on every issue.
The national security candidate wants to cut spending on our national security. Wait until the generals and the admirals hear that.
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Actually, if I were to become president, one of my first duties would be to slash the defense budget. BIG TIME. Of course, doing that still in Iraq (I would pull out) would be bad as pointed out :)
Good idea, very bad time to do so.
Edwin Hussein @ 4:
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Buying votes, that is what polititians do. Democrats are no different.
Congress just created a 158 billion dollar debt based stimulous package "in a second".
The simple fact is that we are in a credit bubble. It is going to deflate. McCain's tax cut and deficit spending are a desperate attempt to keep the bubble from deflating.
It won't work. All bubbles deflate. Neither political party seems to grasp that fact.
Compartmentalized thinking at work for us!
That could be a McCain campaign bumper sticker.
McCain to boost and cut Pentagon spending at the same time , yeahp , only a Republican can do that !
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