Top McCain Adviser: ‘I Would Like The Next President Not To Talk About Deficit Reduction’
Top McCain Adviser: ‘I Would Like The Next President Not To Talk About Deficit Reduction’
Earlier this year, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) proposed a deficit-reduction plan in which he would balance the budget by 2012. “[T]hat’s my goal. … It has to be our goal, because we’re mortgaging these young people’s future,” he said in February.
Now, McCain’s advisers are abandoning this tough talk. The New York Times reports that chief economic adviser Douglas Holtz-Eakin said the next president should not even talk about balancing the budget, adopting a “so be it” approach to the costs of the Iraq war and McCain’s corporate tax cuts:
[Holtz-Eakin] said the benefits of success in Iraq dwarfed the $150 billion annual cost. He also said that if the war and the personal and corporate tax cuts that Mr. McCain advocated added to the federal deficit and debt, so be it.
“I would like the next president not to talk about deficit reduction,” Mr. Holtz-Eakin said at a symposium sponsored by the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. “The next president should talk about what’s good for American families — education, health care at reasonable costs, pensions that are secure, opening our borders to trade. If we can take care of that, we can take care of the budget.”
Holtz-Eakin has gradually moved away from McCain’s budget plan. While originally proposing a balanced budget by 2012, Holtz-Eakin later conceded that McCain’s tax plan “will make deficits expand up front.” When asked last week about the budget , “McCain did not explain how he plans to balance the budget, but spoke generally about hoping to stimulate the economy,” the Times observed.
In reality, McCain’s tax plan costs more than $2 trillion in the first decade by doubling the Bush tax cuts, obliterating prospects of a balanced budget. As Reuters observed, McCain’s plan also leaves much unexplained, failing to explain “how he would rein in the health-care and retirement costs expected to swamp” as boomers retire, the costs of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, and interest on the $10 trillion national debt.
Observing how McCain’s budget numbers simply don’t add up, Newsweek’s Daniel Gross noted, “McCain’s fiscal program is either a joke or a fantasy.”
Now, McCain’s top economic adviser is admitting that McCain will essentially run away from the $400 billion budget deficit as president.
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It’s just those “Borrow and Spend” Republics, again.
April 14th, 2008 at 7:42 pmAs ABC News helpfully reminds us, April 15th is John McCain Tax Flip-Flop Day. McCain, as you’ll recall, twice voted against President Bush’s budget-busting tax cuts for the richest Americans who need them least. But having undergone a supply-side conversion on the road to the White House, John McCain now wants to make them permanent.
For the details, see:
April 14th, 2008 at 7:46 pm“April 15th is John McCain Tax Flip-Flop Day.”
I thought April 1st was John McCain is a straight shooter day.
April 14th, 2008 at 7:47 pm“I would like the next president not to talk about deficit reduction,” Mr. Holtz-Eakin said, “until after he’s elected. Then he can tell the American people to buzz off.”
April 14th, 2008 at 7:50 pmIf we don’t talk about it, it doesn’t exist!!
Lalalalalalalalaaaa….
April 14th, 2008 at 7:50 pmIt’s not a ’so be it’ approach, it’s a ‘let someone else (grandchildren/anyone but me) deal with it’ approach.
April 14th, 2008 at 7:52 pmEarlier this year, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) proposed a deficit-reduction plan in which he would balance the budget by 2012. “[T]hat’s my goal. … It has to be our goal, because we’re mortgaging these young people’s future,” he said in February.
Now talk about irony. He doesn’t see that it is his party who has mortgaged our children’s future.
I can’t see any way that McCain can win this election. With 61% of the people in this country against the occupation of Iraq and 81% think our country is going in the wrong direction, how can he possibly win once people meet the real John McCain, not the mythical creature they are being given by the MSM. It’s too bad posts like this never make it out of the blogisphere.
April 14th, 2008 at 8:01 pmBTW, has John McCain released his tax returns yet?
April 14th, 2008 at 8:03 pmhelenahandbasket Says:
It’s just those “Borrow and Spend” Republics, again.
__________________
Hey… I am NOT a “borrow and spend” kinda Republic…
Mebbe “borrow and not pay back for a while”… but that’s a different issue…
April 14th, 2008 at 8:13 pmIf John Sidney McCain III is elected and his chief economic adviser is Douglas Holtz-Eakin, America is screwed.
April 14th, 2008 at 8:16 pmstep 1: stop forcing the american taxpayer to bribe foreigners not to shoot at our troops..
http://news.yahoo.com/ s/ ap/ 20080414/ ap_on_go_co/ us_iraq_free_ride_over;_ylt=Ar9GnvzhWk8l9sRkPgT7Im1h24cA
“..Their bill also would require that Baghdad pay for the fuel used by American troops and take over U.S. payments to predominantly Sunni fighters in the Awakening movement…”
ah, but i’ll bet we’ll run into problems here, because for the life of me, i dont see the shia central government happily funding sunni militias…
April 14th, 2008 at 8:24 pmhelena @1,
I like to call them “attack and spend” Republicans.
April 14th, 2008 at 8:26 pmBilbo Hussein Baggins Says:
I can’t see any way that McCain can win this election.
April 14th, 2008 at 8:01 pm
He shouldn’t win as you indicate, but what has me on edge is the absolute love affair he has going with the conventional media. They just love him to death. He has gotten a free pass thus far.
Now if the general public, which does not follow what is going on, except through sound bites, and listens to the opinions of “experts” such as Chris Mathews, Cokie Roberts, David Broder, or Bill Kristol (not to mention the right wing smear pundits at Faux and right wing talk radio) he might do quite well. It is this media that acts like a teenager in love with an entertainment idol that really concerns me.
April 14th, 2008 at 8:28 pmKrusty the Clown lives! Is anyone really stupid enough to vote for this assbag?
April 14th, 2008 at 8:36 pmPhil pheckin’ GRAMM is McSame’s economics witch-doctor.
‘Nuff said.
April 14th, 2008 at 8:42 pmMOTHER OF GOD!
April 14th, 2008 at 8:45 pmNewsweek’s Daniel Gross noted, “McCain’s fiscal program is either a joke or a fantasy.”
Like McCain, his fiscal program is a nightmare.
April 14th, 2008 at 8:53 pmLet’s bill republicans and their supporters to make up the deficit. Iraq was all theirs. Fiscal irresponsibility is all theirs. Let’s not only repeal the 1%ers tax break, let’s impose Kennedyesque taxes on them, and balance the books.
Jefferson’s quotes…
If there is one principle more deeply rooted in the mind of every American, it is that we should have nothing to do with conquest.
It is incumbent on every generation to pay its own debts as it goes. A principle which if acted on would save one-half the wars of the world.
Thomas Jefferson.
April 14th, 2008 at 9:03 pmSo why are we worried. I mean just because today’s kids are going to have to pay for a record number of baby boomers retiring and living longer doesn’t mean they won’t be able to pay this ginormous debt does it? After all eventually “trickle down economics” has to start working doesn’t it?
April 14th, 2008 at 9:21 pm[Holtz-Eakin] said the benefits of success in Iraq dwarfed the $150 billion annual cost.
Does it “dwarf” the cost in lives, especially considering that no one has been able to realistically define what “success” means in the first place?
April 14th, 2008 at 10:13 pmWell, paying $400 billion a year in interest on the existing debt isn’t causing enough pain.
Let’s add to it!
April 14th, 2008 at 10:34 pmfrom the google news page… it occurred to me, makes a fine example of media
headlines presentation:
McCain would hike drug costs for wealthy Americans
Reuters - 2 hours ago
By Steve Holland PITTSBURGH (Reuters) - US Republican presidential candidate John McCain will outline economic proposals on Tuesday that would increase drug costs for wealthy seniors and freeze billions in government spending for a year.
straight and to the point… leave it to the brits…
McCain Proposes Medicare Drug Benefit Changes Washington Post
vague, but safe…
McCain to seek budget review, drug spending cuts MarketWatch
for the free marketers…
April 14th, 2008 at 10:43 pmDeficit reduction requires a President who understands modern economic principles. It takes a President and a Congress willing to work together to make tough choices. Deficit reduction also requires a President with a long view.
John McCain is none of those things.
-AF
April 14th, 2008 at 11:03 pmAndrew Sullivan Is A Fraud
Ronald Reagan was the grandfather of the irresponsibility administration. George H. W. Bush turned the peace divided into a recession. George W. Bush has married those two ideas together and now McCain’s senior advisors are promising more of the same. McCain will devalue the debt with a weak dollar and high inflation. What an exciting prospect. Start making those WIN buttons.
April 14th, 2008 at 11:47 pm.
Hey McSpender
.
April 15th, 2008 at 1:36 am“I would like the next president not to talk about deficit reduction,” Mr. Holtz-Eakin “The next president should talk about what’s good for American families - opening our borders to trade.
If we open up any more borders for FREE TRADE it will be our ruination. Not only have we lost millions of jobs from this, the countries that we plunder are hurt. We go into these countries, the workers are paid sub-standard wages, they end up being worse off than when we came there. Plus all of the corporations funnel all the money out of the country. It is a losing propostion not only for our country but for theirs as well.
Of course, the only winner in this game is the Big Corporations, like that is major surprise. Another case of how can we stick it to the little guy without him knowing.
At the rate of job loses no one in this country will be able to afford buying the products that they are selling.
April 15th, 2008 at 3:48 amWell, I don’t think the US can re-negotiate FTA agreements; it however, can negotiate amendments to the FTA agreements if the other side agrees to it, which of course, include their own Parliament and, if they have one, their own Senate.
As for McCain’s economical program: lets face it, most old school military men like Sen. McCain know nuts about economics. He has always been about Vietnam and the term “never surrender”. Economics is just about a question mark in his mind.
So when his deficit and spend budget maths don’t add up, hey its not expected. What shouldn’t be unexpected as well, though, is that on the basis of overall policy proposals offered by all three, McCain is sure the weakest one, and based on that assessment, he shouldn’t be elected as President.
Even I, an Obama supporter, would rather give my vote to Clinton(with some apprehension though) than to McCain. In the end, the US needs a Democrat in the White House again.
April 15th, 2008 at 5:43 amSomeone looks as a dry drunk.
April 15th, 2008 at 5:47 amCan I run my business like that?
April 15th, 2008 at 11:04 amNo, I didn’t think so.
When you marry into money, it’s easy to see how you can be clueless about economics.