Tag Archive » john mccain
Word arrived today that Barack Obama would not be accepting public financing for his campaign. The news is far from shocking in the context of the campaign — in fact it makes sense in almost every political way — but that doesn’t change the historical fact that Obama now becomes the first candidate of a major party to reject public financing since the system was created in 1976.
As the New York Times explains:
Under the federal presidential financing system, a candidate this year would be given $84.1 million from the Treasury to finance a general election campaign. In exchange, the candidate is barred from accepting private donations, or from spending more than the $84.1 million.
McCain will accept those funds (and thus the limits imposed by them) and Obama will not. It makes sense for his campaign because Obama can easily raise more than the $84.1 million public financing would have provided, and it makes sense practically because Obama’s campaign is not accepting the lobbyist, PAC, and 527 money that will pour into McCain’s war chest. Just as importantly, as the Times notes, contribution limits to political parties — where Republicans still hold an advantage — are so convoluted that it puts the entire public financing system into question. That is exactly what Obama himself argued today saying,
The public financing of presidential elections as it exists today is broken, and we face opponents who’ve become masters at gaming this broken system. John McCain’s campaign and the Republican National Committee are fueled by contributions from Washington lobbyists and special interest PACs. And we’ve already seen that he’s not going to stop the smears and attacks from his allies running so-called 527 groups, who will spend millions and millions of dollars in unlimited donations.
One-year earmark moratorium fails in Senate
A closely watched proposal for a congressional “time out” on earmark spending failed by a wide margin late Thursday night, creating some unusual Senate alliances along the way. Senators voted 71-29 against a measure by Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) that would have imposed a one-year moratorium on earmarks. The measure needed 60 votes to pass because it was ruled non-germane to the budget, prompting DeMint to ask that the Budget Act be waived. Presidential candidates Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.), Barack Obama (D-Ill.) and John McCain (R-Ariz.) all voted for the amendment, as expected. In a surprise, so did Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), a longtime top appropriator for Kentucky who has traditionally taken a skeptical approach to the idea of limiting earmark spending. “The DeMint-McCain amendment would have provided an important pause to allow us all—those who oppose earmarks and those who favor them—to take a step back, build a better oversight system, and allow these reforms to be implemented,” McConnell said in a subsequent statement.
Read the story from The Hill | No Comments | Posted March 14, 2008 at 10:19 AM by Sam Bear
An Upside for the Middle Class
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton declares, “The economy is not working for middle-class and working families,” noting the typical American family earns less now than it did seven years ago. Citing the same trend, her Democratic presidential rival, Sen. Barack Obama, promises “to put America back on the path to prosperity.” Sen. John McCain, the likely Republican nominee, says, “It is harder for families to weather hard economic times.” The candidates’ pitches are aimed at wooing the vast majority of Americans who consider themselves middle class. Those people tell pollsters that they are increasingly anxious about their financial security, a feeling that has intensified in recent years because of flattening wages, rising income inequality, increasing consumer debt, soaring health-care costs, spiraling energy prices and, now, declining home values. But as Americans’ wage growth has slowed, their rate of consumption has accelerated, leaving some economists dubious about claims that the middle class is worse off than before.
Read the story from Washington Post | No Comments | Posted February 28, 2008 at 9:06 PM by Alex Tievsky
One of the most interesting conversations we have going on the site so far is about creating universal health care. Here are the facts: nearly 47 million people in this country are currently uninsured; of those 47 million, more than 80% come from working families; while in 1987, 70% of people had employer-based insurance, that number is down to 59.5%; and, finally, 40% of America’s uninsured live in households that earn more than $50,000 a year. The reason for the increasing number of uninsured Americans is simple: insurance premiums are rising at just about 5 times the rate of inflation.It’s an incredibly important issue, and our users are doing a great job tackling a lot of important questions. Some of them are skeptical:
Gagarin wants to know how we would pay for a universal health care program:
UHC would be very peachy and nice, but someone has to tell me how they’re going to pay for it, WITHOUT saying they’re going to “tax the rich people ’cause they don’t need the money” because thinking that will increase revenue rather than reduce it is wishful thinking.
Lobachevsky thinks the government might be overstepping its role:
The government should be involved in situations that individuals cannot control. I do believe that the state of our current health care system is not satisfactory, and that it requires some government involvement, but not to the extent of national health care. The national government should put its time and effort, and our money, into stimulating competition in the health insurance market as to make it more affordable to all Americans.
In my opinion, universal health care is a moral imperative. While stephendolenc compares health care to “universal cell phone ownership [and] universal fitness club memberships,” I think the comparison to public education is much more apt. I don’t believe we have any more of a right to deny an American citizen the ability to be treated by a doctor than we have to deny them the services of the Fire Department should their home catch fire. Click here to continue reading…
