Paul Krugman’s most recent blog post has a great chart highlighting Bush’s dismal record of job creation, comparing it to job creation during the Clinton administration:

This chart alone is striking. Job growth under Bush was abysmal, when compared to the eight previous years of steady increase. Taking Krugman’s chart a step further, David Madland of the Center for American Progress compares Bush’s performance on job creation not just to Clinton, but to the other 41 American presidents who have come before him. Madland concludes that aside from Herbert Hoover — the only American president to ever LOSE jobs during his term in office — Bush has the worst record on job creation in this country.Now going back to Krugman’s, and Dean Baker’s point, we agree that it is absurd to suggest that McCain’s economic plan is more committed to job creation than that of his competitor. If the Washington Post is going to discuss McCain’s “emphasis on job creation,” then it would be disingenuous to leave out the other hallmark of his proposal: a continuation of the Bush tax cuts with particular weight on reducing corporate taxation.

According to a study by the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office on policy responses to short-term economic weakness, the focal point of McCain’s plan, a cut in the corporate tax rate, is fundamentally flawed:

The most common form of a general cut in business taxes is a reduction in the corporate tax rate. This approach, however, is not a particularly cost-effective method of stimulating business spending: Increasing the after-tax income of businesses typically does not create an incentive for them to spend more on labor or to produce more, because production depends on the ability to sell output.

So let’s connect the dots. McCain wants to follow Bush’s lead on tax cuts — not only extend them past their 2010 expiration, but deepen them further by cutting the corporate rate from 35 percent down to 25 percent. A cut in the corporate tax rate is not only an inefficient means of creating jobs, but as Krugman and Madland point out, the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy have resulted in embarrassingly low levels of job creation.

So unless John McCain is running against Herbert Hoover in the fall, any competitor will find themselves with greater “emphasis on job creation” than the Maverick from Arizona.

Our guest blogger is Adam Jentleson, the Communications and Outreach Director for the Hyde Park Project at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

Much has been made about John McCain’s efforts to court women voters. Those efforts are not going so well. As today’s Gallup poll shows, McCain’s support among women is falling fast.

As Disco Stu said, “If these trends continue… Ayyy.” And it’s a safe bet that they will – because the more women learn about McCain’s policy positions, the less they’re going to like him. Consider:

– McCain opposes efforts to ensure that women get paid equal wages for equal work. Women make 77 cents for every dollar men earn, adding up to hundreds of thousands, sometimes millions of dollars over the course of a career and retirement. But McCain recently skipped a vote on a critical bill needed to advance women’s right to equal pay because he thought “it would lead to more lawsuits”; he told a 14 year-old girl who asked about it, “I don’t believe that this would do anything to help the rights of women, except maybe help trial lawyers and others in that profession.”

– McCain supports a Constitutional Amendment banning abortion. On “Meet the Press” in 2000, McCain repeatedly told host Tim Russert that he supported a Constitutional ban on all abortions. Russert pressed:

MR. RUSSERT: But, Senator, women across the country would say, “Senator McCain, prior to Roe vs. Wade, hundreds of thousands of women a year went to the back alleys to have abortions.”

SEN. McCAIN: I understand that.

MR. RUSSERT: Many died.

SEN. McCAIN: I understand that. [NBC, Meet the Press, 1/30/00]

– McCain thinks Roe v. Wade should be overturned. Sen. McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign website states that he “believes Roe v. Wade is a flawed decision that must be overturned.”

– McCain supported limits on access to contraceptives. McCain supported limits on access to contraceptives. In 2003, McCain opposed legislation to expand access to emergency contraceptives. And in 1994, he voted for an amendment put forward by former Sen. Jesse Helms (R-NC) to prohibit distribution of condoms, contraceptives, or drugs financed by federal aid without parental consent. In 2003, McCain opposed legislation to expand access to emergency contraceptives. And in 1994, he voted for an amendment put forward by former Sen. Jesse Helms (R-NC) to prohibit distribution of condoms, contraceptives, or drugs financed by federal aid without parental consent.

– McCain said he will appoint “clones of Alito and Roberts.” The effect of a conservative judiciary would not just be limited to choice and privacy. Over the past two decades, there have been a large number of 5-to-4 decisions limiting the reach of civil rights statutes. We’d feel the effects of having Alito/Roberts clones on the Supreme Court, as well as on lower courts, for generations to come.

As our new report outlines, these are just some of the extreme positions McCain has taken. He has also opposed health care for poor children, voted against the minimum wage seven times (most minimum wage workers are women), and has proposed no solutions for bringing America’s family and medical leave policies into the 21st Century to help working women balance the demands of work and family.

Of course, these issues don’t just impact women – but if McCain is looking to get them on his side, he’s got a tough sell ahead of him.

Our guest bloggers are Center for American Progress Action Fund fellows Robert Gordon and James Kvaal.

The highly respected Tax Policy Center (TPC) has posted a new side-by-side analysis comparing the McCain and Obama tax agendas. If accurate, this post indicates that the McCain team has described to TPC policies that differ dramatically from policies that remain on McCain’s website and, in one instance, were reiterated by McCain just yesterday.

Alternative Minimum Tax. Yesterday, McCain said he supports “a phase-out of the Alternative Minimum Tax.” His website still says he will “permanently repeal the AMT.” TPC says, however, that McCain wants to “[e]xtend and index 2007 AMT patch, further increase exemption by 5 percent in excess of inflation after 2013 (temporarily).” That’s relief from the AMT, but well short of “permanent repeal” or “phase out.”

Corporate Expensing. McCain’s website still features his proposal “to permit corporations to immediately deduct the cost of equipment investment, providing a valuable pro-growth investment incentive.” That is enormously costly. In a fact sheet also still available on the website, the McCain campaign compares this proposal to a “modest” partial expensing measure scored by the Treasury Department as costing $1.2 trillion over 10 years. But TPC says that McCain is now proposing only to “allow first-year deduction of 3 and 5-year equipment,” and that McCain also wants a complementary repeal of the interest tax deduction. The TPC also says that McCain’s proposal “expires.” With these modifications, the proposal’s cost will be less than 2% of the proposal that McCain once deemed “modest.”

Substantively, these changes are mostly (modest) moves in the right direction — although they also show McCain manipulating phase-ins and phase-outs just as President Bush has done for the last eight years. But our first question is: What is the McCain policy–what’s on their website, or what they seem to have told TPC?