Campaign Falsehoods on Health Care, Oil Companies, Trade, Taxes, and Worker Training

"McCain's falsehoods on health care, oil companies, trade, taxes and worker training were egregious and covered up his pro-corporate positions."

"Under McCain's Plan, Health Insurance Benefits Would be Taxed For The First Time, Resulting In A $3.6 Trillion Tax Increase On Working Families. McCain's health care plan would eliminate the payroll deduction on health care benefits, which would have the effect of raising taxes on working families by $3.6 trillion. [New York Times, 5/1/08]"

"McCain's Tax Plan Will Cut Taxes For Oil Companies by Nearly $4 Billion - Including $1.2 Billion for Exxon. A study by the Center for American Progress Action Fund noted that the corporate tax rate cut included in the McCain tax plan "would deliver a $3.8 billion tax cut to the five largest American oil companies" - ExxonMobil, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, Valero Energy, and Marathon. According to their analysis ofExxon's financial statements, the company would receive a tax savings of $1.2 billion under the McCain plan. ["The McCain Plan to Cut Oil CompanyTaxes by Nearly $4 Billion," Center for American Progress Action Fund, 3/27/08]"

"McCain Supported NAFTA, Which Contributed to Loss of a Million American Jobs, And CAFTA. John McCain supported both the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA). The Economic Policy Institute has estimated that NAFTA contributed to the loss of 1 million American jobs since it took effect in 1994. [Vote 395, HR 3450, 61-38, 11/20/93; Vote 170, S.1307, 54-45, 6/30/05; "Revisiting NAFTA; Still not working for North America's workers," The Economic Policy Institute,9/28/06]"

"Washington Post: McCain's Approach To Taxes Is Far More Costly Than Obama's. "There is a serious debate to be had in this presidential campaign about the fundamentally different tax policies of Barack Obama and John McCain. Then there is the phony, misleading and at times outright dishonest debate that the McCain campaign has been waging -- most recently with a television ad. The two candidates have very different positions on taxes. Mr. Obama wants to raise taxes on the wealthiest Americans and cut them substantially for low- and middle-income taxpayers. He would cut taxes for more households, and by a larger amount, than Mr. McCain, who would give the greatest benefits to wealthy households and corporations. The McCain campaign insists on completely misrepresenting Mr. Obama's plan. The country can't afford the tax cuts either man is promising, although Mr. McCain's approach is by far the more costly. We don't expect either side to admit that. But neither side should get to outright lie about its opponent's positions, either." [Editorial, Washington Post, 8/31/08]"

"Worker Training"
[We leave out the section on “Worker Training” as it's not ethical for either candidate to suggest taxing fellow citizens to provide “retraining” for a select few. We'd also appreciate it if AlterNet would provide the same fact checking to Senator Obama's campaign rhetoric. --MJ]

full story AlterNet [Staff?]: Exposing Five Dangerous Lies in McCain's Big Speech