by Frank James
So many critics have spent the last week or so demolishing the McCain-Palin line of attack that Sen. Barack Obama wants to give "welfare" in the form of tax credits to people who don't pay income taxes, you would think the Republican ticket would've given up on that one and moved on to another attack line.
You would be wrong.
Gov. Sarah Palin today blasted the idea of people who don't pay income taxes getting a tax credit.
She was campaigning today in Roswell, N.M. of Area 51 fame and continued the attack on Obama's idea of providing Americans with tax credits:
"He claims that he'll cut income taxes for 95 percent of Americans. But the problem is, more than 40 percent of Americans pay no income taxes at all. So, how can you cut income taxes for folks who don't pay them?
It turns out, the question is the key to Barack Obama's plan since you can't reduce taxes on those who pay zero, he wants the government to send them a check that's called a tax credit. (boos) And where is he going to get the money from all those checks he's going to cut? By raising taxes on America's hard working families and our small businesses and a lot of folks just like Joe the Plumber and Ed the Dairyman out there." (she points into the audience.)
As I said earlier, many critics have taken on this attack in the past week or to point out the problems with this particular McCain-Palin charge.
But the Republican presidential campaign seems as unwilling to shift gears on this one as UFO proponents who can't let go of the idea that the U.S. government is still sitting on top secret information about an alien spacecraft and bodies that supposedly crashed in the area in 1947.
Here' are a few well-publicized problems with the McCain-Palin charges.
Instead of being akin to socialism, the idea of giving tax credits to those who haven't paid income taxes is pretty orthodox, even among Republicans.
It was hailed by no less a conservative than President Ronald Reagan, McCain's hero, who supported one of the best-known of such credits, the Earned Income Tax Credit or EITC.
In a May 1985 White House speech in which he was pitching his tax-reform proposal which later passed, Reagan said:
"Our plan will also mean an historic correction of a problem we've let go on too long -- the increasing tax burden on low- and fixed-income Americans that's been knocking the bottom rungs off the ladder of opportunity. A compassionate, profamily opportunity society should give a break as well to those Americans struggling to get by and move up. And that's exactly what we intend to do.
By hiking the earned income tax credit, indexing it for inflation, and practically doubling the personal exemption, we can make sure that the working families do not suffer under the burden of Federal taxation. Giving a leg up to those struggling to move up is what America is all about. And that's a top priority of our tax proposal"
The EITC credit goes to lower income familes who may not have paid income taxes because of their relatively low income.
Because they approach the world somewhat differently than the rest of us, economists call such tax credits "refundable" even though, again, the income earner who gets the credit may not have paid any income tax.
But the income earner most assuredly paid payroll taxes and the EITC is meant to offset those at least in part. Thus, the EITC has been seen as an important way to boost incomes for low families.
As many critics have also pointed out by now, if McCain is really opposed to refundable tax credits, he has a strange way of showing it. His health-insurance proposal relies hugely on that very idea. McCain's proposal calls for a $5,000 tax credit per family including families that don't pay taxes.
So the whole attack on Obama for his use of tax credits is fairly disingenuous on McCain-Palin's part, unless they've decided to jettison their health-insurance proposal and the EITC, in which case, they should let us know.
While Palin was in Roswell today, she might as well have accused Obama of being part of the government conspiracy to hide the space aliens bodies. That attack would have as much credence as the one she launched on tax credits.
Comments
The sad thing is, everything you just wrote is Greek to Gov. Palin. She just spits out whatever is fed into her.
Posted by: My Aunt Fanny | October 20, 2008 5:06 PM
I guess when you don't have anything positive to say about your own positions, you revert to the McCain-Palin-Hannity-Limbaugh-Goebbels strategy.
Nazi propaganda chief Joseph Goebbels was the master of the “big lie” tactic in which a lie, no matter how outrageous, is repeated often enough that it will eventually be accepted as truth. Goebbels explained:
“If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.”
Posted by: Bill H. | October 20, 2008 5:09 PM
My Aunt Fanny, you are too right. I read in an article this morning that Palin said that she didn't think the Ayers Robocalls were a good idea but that it was up to the "top brass of the campaign " to decide. It seems to me that as one of the two candidates she should BE the "top brass", but instead she makes it sound like there are people in the campaign who's orders she dares not question. It was a pretty sad insight into the sham that is the McCain Campaign. The candidates do whatever the "Top Brass" ( Davis and Black) tell them.
Posted by: Liz | October 20, 2008 5:25 PM
Where's the coverage of Biden's warning that within 6 months of an Obama administration that he will be tested with a dire global situation to test Obama's strength? They've been playing it all day on TV, but nothing here except Palin bashing, typical.
Posted by: vla | October 20, 2008 7:14 PM
Conservatives Are Still Trying To Come To Grips With Losing:
Palin is a problem. It isn't just David Brooks saying so:
"[Sarah Palin] represents a fatal cancer to the Republican party. When I first started in journalism, I worked at the National Review for Bill Buckley. And Buckley famously said he'd rather be ruled by the first 2,000 names in the Boston phone book than by the Harvard faculty. But he didn't think those were the only two options. He thought it was important to have people on the conservative side who celebrated ideas, who celebrated learning. And his whole life was based on that, and that was also true for a lot of the other conservatives in the Reagan era. Reagan had an immense faith in the power of ideas. But there has been a counter, more populist tradition, which is not only to scorn liberal ideas but to scorn ideas entirely. And I'm afraid that Sarah Palin has those prejudices. I think President Bush has those prejudices."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/08/david-brooks-sarah-palin_n_133001.html
And Peggy Noonan summarizes:
"But we have seen Mrs. Palin on the national stage for seven weeks now, and there is little sign that she has the tools, the equipment, the knowledge or the philosophical grounding one hopes for, and expects, in a holder of high office. She is a person of great ambition, but the question remains: What is the purpose of the ambition? She wants to rise, but what for? For seven weeks I've listened to her, trying to understand if she is Bushian or Reaganite—a spender, to speak briefly, whose political decisions seem untethered to a political philosophy, and whose foreign policy is shaped by a certain emotionalism, or a conservative whose principles are rooted in philosophy, and whose foreign policy leans more toward what might be called romantic realism, and that is speak truth, know America, be America, move diplomatically, respect public opinion, and move within an awareness and appreciation of reality."
"But it's unclear whether she is Bushian or Reaganite. She doesn't think aloud. She just . . . says things."
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122419210832542317.html
And now you also have Colin Powell, who says that Sarah Palin is not qualified to be President of the United States on MTP yesterday.
Meanwhile assigning a category for Palin without including Tail-gunner Joe McCarthy (Michelle Bachmann) will be difficult for conservatives.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vy7tv0VQDnQ
Especially with Palin on the stump, saying crazy things like this:
"We believe that the best of America is not all in Washington, D.C.," Palin said at a Greensboro, NC fundraiser Thursday. "We believe, we believe that the best of America is in these small towns that we get to visit, and in these wonderful little pockets of what I call the real America, being here with all of you hard-working, very patriotic, pro-America areas of this great nation."
http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalradar/2008/10/biden-blasts-pa.html
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Posted by: McCain = Bush's third term | October 20, 2008 7:43 PM
Bad news for Palin:
McCain campaign just announced he's dumping her and asking Tina Fey to run in her place.
When Murphy and Noonan called Palin a cynical choice when they thought the microphone was turned off, their instinctive reaction was right.
She's trailer trash whose job is talking trash.
But today at lunch at my club, one stalwart Republican who is not a stupid man said, yes, he thought Palin would be a good president if it came to that.
She has more "executive experience" than Obama, he pointed out. 28,000 state employees in Alaska.
Seemed to forget that Lincoln had NO executive experience before 1861.
And FDR only had 4 as Governor of NY in 1933.
Posted by: ornery | October 20, 2008 8:40 PM
Sorry Frank, Obama calls it a tax cut for 95%.
And he calls for huge spending increases for his Socialism programs.
Since the top 10% pay 70% of the taxes and 40% of people pay no taxes, how are the top payers going to cover Obama's Social programs?
He either has to sock the producers with a huge increase or tax the other 90% of us.
Obama is disingenuous and he's lying.
Posted by: Alz | October 20, 2008 11:46 PM
What do you expect from a woman who can't even interpret the findings of an investigation that clearly states that she abused her power as Governor?
Posted by: Rodger | October 21, 2008 7:20 AM
THANK YOU FOR FINALLY REPORTING ABOUT THE EITC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Why doesn't the mainstream media discuss this? Turn on FOX, CNN, MSNBC, PBS, CBS and you will not hear EITC mentioned ONCE in the last week. WHY?
Posted by: John Kay | October 21, 2008 12:21 PM
I'm trying to reconcile the ideas that Obama is going to give a tax cut to 95% of Americans while trying to find money to fund his $3 trillion dollars spending plan. There is no way that Obama can carry out his promises especially when the world economy is in the brink of a recession. The only conclusion is: Obama is a fraud.
Posted by: Ryan | October 24, 2008 8:41 PM
We have been bamboozeled by Obama and company.
Posted by: Margaret | October 26, 2008 12:09 AM