There He Goes Again
September 18, 2008
McCain ad misrepresents Obama's tax plan. Again.
Summary
The McCain-Palin campaign has released a new ad that once again distorts Obama's tax plans.
The ad claims Obama will raise taxes on electricity. He hasn't proposed any such tax. Obama does support a cap-and-trade policy that would raise the costs of electricity, but so does McCain.
It falsely claims he would tax home heating oil. Actually, Obama proposed a rebate of up to $1,000 per family to defray increased heating oil costs, funded by what he calls a windfall profits tax on oil companies.
The ad claims that Obama will tax "life savings." In fact, he would increase capital gains and dividends taxes only for couples earning more than $250,000 per year, or singles making $200,000. For the rest, taxes on investments would remain unchanged.
The McCain campaign argues in its documentation for this ad that, whatever Obama says he would do, he will eventually be forced to break his promise and raise taxes more broadly to pay for his promised spending programs. That's an opinion they are certainly entitled to express, and to argue for. But their ad doesn't do that. Instead, it simply presents the McCain camp's opinion as a fact, and it fails to alert viewers that its claims are based on what the campaign thinks might happen in the future.
Analysis
In what has become an ongoing theme, the McCain-Palin campaign has released yet another ad that makes false claims about Barack Obama's tax plan. The ad, which was released on Sept. 18 and which the campaign says will air nationally, claims that Obama will raise income taxes and will tax "life savings, electricity and home heating oil." As we keep saying, Obama says he'll raise income taxes and capital gains taxes only for couples earning more than $250,000 per year or singles making over $200,000. He has proposed no plans to raise taxes on either home heating oil or electricity.
Electric Charges
McCain-Palin 2008 Ad:
"Dome"
Narrator: When our economy's in crisis, a big government casts a big shadow on us all.
Obama and his liberal Congressional allies want a massive government, billions in spending increases, wasteful pork.
And, we would pay -- painful income taxes, skyrocketing taxes on life savings, electricity and home heating oil.
Can your family afford that?
McCain: I'm John McCain and I approve this message.The ad opens with standard-issue Republican warnings of the economic dangers of big government before proclaiming that Obama and his liberal allies want to bring back "a massive government" complete with billions in spending increases and waste. We are then told that Obama would raise income taxes and would increase taxes on "life savings, electricity and home heating oil."
This isn't the first time the McCain-Palin campaign has claimed that Obama would raise taxes on electricity. The claim is just as false now as it was when it first came up. The campaign bases its charge on a single comment Obama made in an interview with a San Antonio columnist. Obama did in fact say, "What we ought to tax is dirty energy, like coal and, to a lesser extent, natural gas." But, as we said then, the comment is grossly out of context. Obama's remark comes after he was asked whether we ought to tax renewable energy sources. This was not a general call for increasing taxes on coal or natural gas, and Obama certainly does not have any such proposal as part of his public platform.
One could argue that Obama's proposed cap-and-trade program constitutes an indirect tax on electricity. But McCain proposes cap-and-trade, too, and we haven't heard McCain say that he wants to tax your electric bill. These programs are designed to reduce carbon emissions by requiring companies to pay for pollution credits. Since most electricity in the U.S. is generated via coal and natural-gas plants, both carbon-emitting fossil fuels, a cap-and-trade program will result in higher electricity costs.
Overheated Claims
Contrary to the ad's claim, Obama has not proposed raising taxes on home heating oil. In fact, just the opposite. Obama is proposing rebate checks of up to $500 per individual or $1,000 per family for what he calls an "emergency energy rebate." Obama says the rebate would be large enough that a typical family in a northern state could offset the full increase in home heating costs that have resulted from rising oil prices. Obama plans to fund the rebate through a five-year windfall profits tax on oil companies.
The McCain-Palin campaign counters that a windfall profits tax on oil companies will raise the cost of heating oil. The campaign points to a Washington Post editorial which charges that the cost of the five-year tax:
Washington Post (Aug. 6): would be passed along in forgone investment in new production, lower dividends for pension funds and other shareholders, and higher prices at the pump
which pisses me off, cuz they're your posts 
