Legal Commentary

Spreading the Wealth

By TChris

Calling Barack Obama a liberal did not advance John McCain's cause, so he's trying out a more sinister word: socialist. Never mind that McCain voted for a bailout plan that creates a degree of government ownership of private financial institutions. That's socialism we can believe in. It's Obama's offhand remark to Joe the Plumber that a tax increase on upper incomes will "spread the wealth" that marks the socialistic tendency McCain has seized upon as the distraction of the day.

As always, Obama responded quickly, calmly, and forcefully.

"John McCain is so out of touch with the struggles you are facing that he must be the first politician in history to call a tax cut for working people ‘welfare,’” Obama told a massive crowd under the infamous St. Louis arch. “The only ‘welfare’ in this campaign is John McCain’s plan to give another $200 billion in tax cuts to the wealthiest corporations in America.”

[more ...]

“George Bush and John McCain are out of ideas, they are out of touch, and if you stand with me in 17 days they’ll be out of time,” Obama added to wild applause.

Taxation redistributes wealth. In the ideal Republican world, it redistributes wealth from the bottom 80 percent to the top 5 percent. You won't see Dick Cheney griping that taxes paid by working people are redistributed to Haliburton. Obama is right (although maybe not smart to say so publicly) that spreading the wealth and reversing the income gap that widened during the Bush years is good policy. The answer he gave today was good politics.

Full post as published by TalkLeft on October 18, 2008 (boomark / email).