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McCain to propose tax cuts, lash Democrats
2008-04-15 Republican presidential candidate John McCain on Tuesday will propose middle-income tax cuts, accuse Democratic rivals of backing big tax increases and distance himself from the Bush government. Arizona Sen. McCain, accused by Democrats Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama of seeking to extend the economic policies of President George W. Bush, will lay out his most detailed plan to date of how he would address the ailing U.S. economy in a speech in Pittsburgh. He will propose establishing a simpler U.S. tax system to serve as an alternative to the current tax code and give Americans a choice of which one to use. As he has in the past, he will pledge to seek a reduction in the corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 25 percent because, as he will say in his speech, "high tax rates are driving many businesses and jobs overseas." In addition, he will propose a phase-out of the alternative minimum tax, a tax originally set up to ensure that rich Americans with a lot of tax deductions pay a minimum amount of tax, but which is now requiring millions of Americans to pay more taxes. He said he wanted to save more than 25 million middle-class families more than $2,000 every year. And McCain will use the speech to not only put some distance between him and the Bush administration but also say both Democrats and fellow Republicans are guilty of spending excesses. "In all of this, it will not be enough to simply dust off the economic policies of four, eight, or 28 years ago," McCain will say, according to speech excerpts released by his campaign. "We have our own work to do. We have our own challenges to meet." McCain will slam his Democratic rivals for ambitious spending plans that he said would causes taxes to rise for "Americans of every background," totaling $1 trillion over a decade. He will poke fun at Obama's book title, "The Audacity of Hope." "All these tax increases are the fine print under the slogan of 'hope': They're going to raise your taxes by thousands of dollars per year -- and they have the audacity to hope you don't mind," he will say. SPENDING CUTS McCain will aim his message at conservative Republicans concerned about government spending increases under Bush and at independent voters he hopes will help put him in the White House in November. "In so many ways, we need to make a clean break from the worst excesses of both political parties. For Republicans, it starts with reclaiming our good name as the party of spending restraint," he will say. McCain will say it is possible to save $100 billion by ending wasteful spending and weeding out unneeded government programs and other "budget reforms," and use the savings to pay for the business income tax cut. He backs a free trade agreement with Colombia that Democrats in the U.S. Congress are fighting, saying free trade helps create U.S. jobs and improve prosperity in other nations. McCain will propose reducing spending in the federal government's Medicare prescription drug program, by requiring older couples making $160,000 to pay higher premiums for the benefit if they are enrolled in the program. Many conservative Republicans have criticized the drug program, a product of the Bush administration, as too large a benefit and believe it should be scaled back. Aides said the plan would save billions of dollars that could be returned to taxpayers or put to a better use. McCain will also call for a one-year freeze in many areas of the federal government -- but not the U.S. military and veterans benefits and pension programs for the poor and elderly -- in order to conduct a review of every federal program, department and agency to determine if it is needed, said Carly Fiorina, an economic adviser to McCain and former chief of Hewlett-Packard. (Editing by Jackie Frank) (To read more about the U.S. political campaign, visit Reuters "Tales from the Trail: 2008" online at http:/blogs.reuters.com/trail08/ )
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