Economy -- Saying One Thing, Doing Another

July 25, 2008

by Faiz Shakir, Amanda Terkel, Satyam Khanna, Matt Corley, Benjamin Armbruster, Ali Frick, Ryan Powers, and Igor Volsky

ECONOMY

Saying One Thing, Doing Another

On Wednesday, the Tax Policy Center released a report finding large disparities between Sen. John McCain's (R-AZ) public economic proposals and his advisers' private assurances. After comparing McCain's public economic policies with the "measured options outlined by his campaign," the center concluded that McCain's public proposals "would cost an additional $2.8 trillion over ten years" above what the campaign's stated policies would cost. Responding to the report, Douglas Holtz-Eakin, McCain's senior economic adviser, argued that the proposals McCain makes in town halls do not constitute official policy. But the differences between McCain's rhetoric and his policies are stark. While McCain's advisers suggest that the senator would "patch" the alternative minimum tax (AMT), McCain promises to completely repeal it. While McCain publicly advertises a broad expansion "of expensing investments," his economic consultants privately assure budget analysts that the senator would allow expensing for "only to three-and five-year equipment and only on a temporary basis." Overall, McCain's public economic pronouncements suggest that a McCain administration would provide even larger tax cuts for the richest Americans, increase the national debt, and reduce access to health insurance. McCain "is making diametrically opposed policy promises to different audiences at the same time," Robert Gordon and James Kvaal of the Center for American Progress observed recently.

MORE TAX CUTS FOR THE RICH: In a recent interview with Forbes, Holtz-Eakin conceded that the senator's tax plan is a pro-business proposal that is "pretty much a non-event on the personal side," saying it is "a package for American companies to manufacture and Americans to sell globally." Indeed, the Tax Policy Center concludes that McCain's plan gives "virtually no" or "very modest benefits" to the bottom 80 percent of taxpayers. While "some lower-income taxpayers benefit from the large cuts in corporate income," most of the benefit will "go to those at the top." On top of that, McCain's public pronouncements would offer an average tax cut that is "almost double the $1,230 tax cut under the economic advisers' version."Moreover, by "repealing rather than simply reducing the AMT" and allowing Americans to file taxes in an alternative system, McCain's plan allows "those in the top tax brackets" to "benefit most." Thus, the richest 0.1 percent of Americans earn "twice the tax cut that they would get under the more modest plan outlined by Senator McCain's economic advisers," the center states.

INCREASE THE NATIONAL DEBT: Since McCain's public promises costs an additional $2.8 trillion, his policies "would add enormously to the public debt" and force a McCain administration to undertake "a radical and unprecedented downsizing of government" to balance the budget by 2013. McCain's public promise to repeal the AMT would "reduce revenues by about $390 billion." His pledge to allow expensing of "all machinery and equipment investments would cost about $740 billion more than the temporary and limited proposal" advocated by his advisers, and his proposed alternative tax system would "reduce tax revenues by almost $1.2 trillion over ten years."

MORE AMERICANS UNINSURED: While it's unclear if McCain's health care plan -- which taxes workers' health benefits and creates new health insurance tax credits -- would expose health benefits to both income and payroll taxes or just to income taxes, experts agree that McCain's radical health care prescription would either result in a tax increase for millions of middle-class families or "blow a hole" in the national budget. The Tax Policy Center analysis concludes that McCain's health care proposal would cost $1.3 trillion over 10 years and eventually force every household to pay higher taxes on their health insurance. McCain's plan would undermine employer-based coverage and leave 55 million Americans without any kind of health insurance. According to the report, by 2013, 16 million Americans would lose the health benefits they get from employers.

ENVIRONMENT -- BECK, BOENHER CALL ARCTIC REFUGE A 'WASTELAND,' CLAIM WILDLIFE IS UNEFFECTED BY DRILLING: On Glenn Beck's CNN program Wednesday, House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) falsely claimed that wildlife in Alaska are not affected by oil operations there. Animals "couldn't care less whether...the pipeline was there, or the oil company was there," he said. Glenn Beck similarly argued that wildlife can't tell if the Trans-Alaska oil pipeline is a "tree or a pipeline," and said that the northern reaches of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge -- where Boehner hopes to drill -- are a "barren wasteland." Far from "not caring" about the presence of oil operations at the 800-square mile Prudhoe Bay facility, native species are dramatically affected by drilling. Scientific surveys have shown that the Central Arctic caribou herd has been "crowded out" due to drilling, reducing their use of the area near the Prudhoe Bay oil fields by 78 percent. In addition, the northern reaches of the Refuge are not a "barren wasteland." According to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the Refuge's northern edge is home to "a greater degree of ecological diversity than any other similar sized area of Alaska's north slope."

ETHICS -- HOUSE LEADERS APPOINT CONTROVERSIAL GOSS TO ETHICS PANEL: Yesterday, House leaders announced the names of four former lawmakers who will serve on a new independent panel that reviews ethics complaints against members. The panel's co-chair will be Porter Goss, a former representative who served as President Bush's CIA director before abruptly resigning in May of 2006. Goss is a controversial choice for the position. As Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Goss opposed investigating the leaking of CIA agent Valerie Plame's idenity. It is also suspected that Goss was connected to defense contractor Brent Wilkes, who was sentenced to 12 years in prison for bribing Duke Cunningham. Goss apparently attended some of the "bacchanals" Wilkes was fond of throwing. Goss was also director of the CIA in 2004 when the agency destroyed at least two videotapes documenting harsh interrogations of detainees, though apparently without Goss's knowledge. Goss's appointment to the ethics panel "surprised even some Republican members of Congress," the Hill reports. "Several shook their heads in disbelief when told he was named to the board."

ADMINISTRATION -- EPA INVESTIGATOR SAYS VOLUNTARY TARGETS 'UNLIKELY' TO REDUCE GREENHOUSE GASES: In April, President Bush called for a "voluntary target" of "halting the growth of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 2025." But a report released yesterday by the Inspector General of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) said that such voluntary pollution-reduction programs have "limited potential" to reduce greenhouse gases (GHG). The report said that it is "unlikely" that voluntary programs would reduce more than 19 percent of greenhouse gas emissions that are projected for various industries in 2010. "If EPA wishes to reduce GHG emissions beyond this point, it needs to consider additional policy options," the report concluded. The Bush administration argues for voluntary programs to reduce carbon intensity, but according to the EPA, "persuading companies to spend money on optional activities 'presents a significant challenge to using voluntary programs as the current solution to reducing greenhouse gases.'" "We will not solve the global warming problem without an across-the-board mandatory program that every polluting company has to participate in," said David Doniger, director of the Natural Resources Defense Council's ClimateCenter.

"A petition to send former White House deputy chief of state Karl Rove to jail over refusing a subpoena to testify before a House committee has gained over 100,000 signatures," according to Robert Greenwald's Brave New Films and online activists.

The EPA's Inspector General's Office has said that "voluntary pollution-reduction programs touted by the Bush administration as part of the solution to global warming have 'limited potential' to reduce greenhouse gases." The "industry’s unwillingness to participate and unreliable data that casts doubt on claimed reductions are hindering efforts to control some of the most potent greenhouse gases."

"House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) on Thursday announced joint appointments to a landmark ethics review board" that will allow private citizens to review allegations against members. The co-chairman will be former CIA director Porter Goss, who "opposed launching an investigation into the Valerie Plame CIA leak case."

"The American public is not buying the arguments of President Bush and the oil industry that new drilling will lower gas prices," with 63 percent saying increased drilling is "more likely to enrich oil companies than to lower gas prices."

Rep. George Miller (D-CA) pledged today to introduce legislation that would "block an eleventh-hour effort by the Labor Department to make it more difficult to limit workers’ exposure to chemicals on the job." Miller said he was determined to stop the "secret rule" that has been described as "a parting gift" to industry from the Bush administration.

"Home foreclosure filings rose 14 percent in the second quarter, the eighth consecutive quarterly climb, and more than doubled from the same period a year-earlier, real estate data firm RealtyTrac said on Friday." Home foreclosures were up 121 percent from a year earlier "amid the worst U.S. housing market downturn since the Great Depression."

The U.S. Embassy in Iraq announced yesterday "that it had expanded tenfold its program to help Iraqi employees of the American government here" to obtain visas and ultimately American citizenship. However, critics noted that the U.S. "had promised several times that it would try to speed up the process, and that it had not come through."

And finally: Ted Stevens sticks by his "series of tubes." In 2006, Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) was widely mocked after he described the internet as "a series of tubes" that "can be filled." Asked this week if he stuck by that description, Stevens said, "I do," before adding that he's "still not sure about the difference between tubes and pipes."

"The House voted Thursday to triple financing to fight AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis around the world, giving new life and new punch to a program credited with saving or prolonging millions of lives in Africa alone."

THINK PROGRESS: Fox News's Bill O'Reilly claims "MoveOn is the new Klan" and its supporters are "Koolaid drinking, zombie followers."

WONK ROOM: Teamsters join fight for good jobs, clean air, clean future.

YEAS & NAYS: Grover Norquist claims the time is right to "re-start the conversation about getting Reagan on the $10 bill."

TALKING POINTS MEMO: Disgraced former General Services Administration head Lurita Doan returns as a commentator for Federal News Radio.

CALIFORNIA: State workers backlash after Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) threatens to cut salaries to minimum wage levels.

LOUISIANA: Recent oil tanker spill is the worst in the area in nearly a decade.

HEALTH CARE: "States continue to have 'many major gaps' in their readiness for an influenza pandemic, the Government Accountability Office reported this week."

[The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge] looks even more like Prudhoe Bay; a snowy, barren wasteland."
-- CNN's Glenn Beck, 7/23/08

VERSUS

"[Parts of the refuge contain] a greater degree of ecological diversity than any other similar sized area of Alaska's north slope."
-- U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

Think Progress

Saying One Thing, Doing Another

Blogroll