The Straight Talk Express: John McCain on George W. Bush
McCain campaigned for the Republican presidential nomination aboard his bus, the “Straight Talk Express.” Through primary states like New Hampshire, New York, South Carolina and Michigan, McCain gave Republican voters straight talk about Bush’s plans for America. Whether it was decrying Bush’s tax cuts for the rich at the expense of our nation’s fiscal health or highlighting Bush’s terrible environmental record as Governor, McCain called it like it was. As President, Bush has taken numerous positions opposite of McCain on key issues such as investigating the causes of 9/11, Bush’s failed policies in Iraq, a real patients’ bill of right or the environment.
McCain’s Straight Talk On: Bush’s Tax Plan
McCain: “Sixty percent of the benefits from Bush’s tax cuts go to the wealthiest 10 percent of Americans, and that’s not the kind of tax relief that Americans need.” [Washington Post, 1/5/00]
McCain: “He’s spending the entire surplus, the entire projected surplus on tax cuts.”… [McCain] said Bush’s plan is aimed at giving tax breaks to the wealthy. “I’m not sure wealthy Americans need one at this particular time,’ McCain said.” [Houston Chronicle, 1/10/00]
McCain: “Your tax plan over the next five years not only spends all of the surplus, it spends twenty billion dollars in addition to that. I’m sure we’ll have that figured out. But this idea that somehow, if the money is left in order to salvage the Social Security for America and Medicare and the debt, that, you don’t understand the role of the president of the United States. The president of the United States will veto bills, will veto bills that spend too much.” [MSNBC/WOOD-TV GOP Debate, Calvin College, Grand Rapids, MI, 1/10/00]
McCain: “The first thing I’d say to a single mom is that I’ve got a tax cut for you, and Governor Bush doesn’t.” [Washington Post, 1/16/00]
McCain: “Governor Bush said he supported tax deduction for long-term health care. He has no provision for that. As far as single parents are concerned, he has no provisions to help the single mother in his tax proposal. We do.” [AP, 1/20/00]
McCain: “Governor Bush wants to give 38 percent of his tax cut to the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans … My friends, I don’t think Bill Gates needs a tax cut – but I think you and your parents do.” [Dallas Morning News, 2/21/00]
McCain’s Straight Talk On: Social Security/Medicare
McCain: “'By not shoring up the Social Security system now with surplus funds we are, by fiat, agreeing to raise payroll taxes in the future,” added McCain, whose own plan is roughly half the size of Bush’s. “I have called this kind of economics ‘fiscally irresponsible.’” [AP, 1/14/99]
McCain: “Governor Bush’s proposal has not one new penny for Social Security, not one penny for to pay down the debt, not one penny for Medicare. There’s a difference there. He puts all the extra surplus into tax cuts. I don’t think we need that. And by the way, thirty-eight percent of his tax cuts goes to the wealthiest one percent of Americans. I don’t think they need that. I think working families need that tax cut rather than the wealthiest.” [CNN, Darlington, SC, 2/12/00]
McCain: “I guess it was bound to happen. Governor Bush’s campaign is getting desperate with a negative ad about me. The fact is, I’ll use the surplus money to fix Social Security, cut your taxes and pay down the debt. Governor Bush uses all the surplus for tax cuts, but not one new penny for Social Security or the debt.” [“Desperate,” McCain 2000 ad]
McCain’s Straight Talk On: Bush as a Different Kind of Republican
McCain: “Unfortunately, Governor Bush is a Pat Robertson Republican who will lose to Al Gore.” [McCain speech in Virginia Beach, VA, McCain 2000 release, 2/28/00]
McCain’s Straight Talk On: Bush as a Positive Campaigner
McCain: “I’m sorry that Governor Bush has orchestrated this campaign so it’s nothing but negative ads. But that’s a decision that he’ll have to live with.” [Hilton Head, SC, 2/18/00]
McCain: “This morning, I heard the most disappointing story of the campaign. A woman told me of a push poll received by her son – a 13-year old Boy Scout – and sponsored by the Bush Campaign which had so negatively portrayed my record as to drive her son to tears. … The Governor should accept my challenge and immediately halt these push-polling calls and take his negative ads off the air.” [McCain 2000 release, 2/10/00]
McCain: “Texas Governor George W. Bush’s continued mudslinging negative campaign reached a new low in his attempts to attack John McCain and paint him as opposed to breast cancer research. However, the Governor’s erroneous attack and insensitive remarks with respect to McCain’s sister, a breast cancer survivor, drew attention to Bush’s poor record on the issue.” [McCain 2000 release, 3/3/00]
McCain’s Straight Talk On: Bush’s Failed Environmental Record
McCain: “Governor Bush is one of the great polluters in history.” [McCain in New York City, 3/4/00]
McCain’s Straight Talk On: Bush & Campaign Finance Reform
McCain: “He was asked what a President George W. Bush might do for the corporate interest of giant Texas energy conglomerate Enron Corp., whose executives bundled some $550,000 in campaign gifts to the Texas governor. McCain chortled: 'They’ll get what the tobacco companies got ‘good government.’” [Boston Globe, 1/12/00]
McCain: “In five years as governor of the state of Texas, Governor Bush never made one proposal on campaign finance reform in a state where unlimited contributions are the order of the day.” Sen. John McCain, [Baltimore Sun, 2/21/00]
McCain: “Governor Bush just said he wants unlimited contributions from individuals. Maybe that explains why there have been sleep-overs at the Governor’s Mansion in Austin by the Pioneers,’ McCain said, referring to reports that eight of Bush’s top presidential fund-raisers have spent the night at the mansion.” [Houston Chronicle, 3/3/00]
McCain’s Straight Talk On: Bush the Reformer
McCain: “I understand Governor Bush is now a reformer. If so, it’s his first day on the job.” [Dallas Morning News, 2/8/00]
McCain: “I’m going to work a lot harder at pointing out that Governor Bush is – if he’s a reformer, I’m an astronaut. That spending – Governor Bush said he would have signed and supported the biggest pork barrel spending bill in history last November. I said I would veto it. Governor Bush is governor of Texas where spending has increased by 35 percent. Under Clinton it’s only increased by 20 percent. And of course, the surplus, he puts it all into tax cuts and none into Social Security, Medicare or paying down the debt. We’re going to define that a lot more.” [Late Edition, CNN, 2/20/00]
McCain’s Straight Talk On: Education Proposals
McCain: “Don’t take the money from public education, as Governor Bush wants to do. Take it from eliminating corporate pork.” [McCain in Grand Rapids, MI, 2/20/00]
McCain: “You want to use funds from public education [to pay for vouchers]. I don’t want to take money from public education.” [Philadelphia Inquirer, 1/27/00]
McCain’s Straight Talk On: Qualifications for President
McCain: “And let me say this: I don’t need any on the job training. I don’t need any help from anybody. I am fully prepared to President of the United States and Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces.” [McCain in Grand Rapids, MI, 2/20/00]
McCain: “There comes a time when our nation’s leader can no longer rely on briefing books and talking points, when the experts and the advisers have all weighed in, when the sum total of one’s life becomes the foundation from which he or she makes the decisions that determine the future of our democracy.” [Sen. John McCain, AP, 9/28/99]
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