Source:
Associated PressCHICAGO) — Democratic Sen. Barack
Obama said Thursday that Sen. John McCain reversed his position on President Bush's deep tax cuts in order to win the Republican presidential nomination, one of his sharpest criticisms yet of the Arizona senator he hopes to face this fall.
Criticizing GOP efforts to extend major tax cuts from Bush's first term and to eliminate the estate tax,
Obama said: "These are all steps that John McCain rightly said were irresponsible when they first came up."
"He made a decision to reverse himself on that," Obama told reporters as he flew from Chicago to Washington for a series of Senate votes on budget issues.
"That was how, I guess, you got your ticket punched to be the Republican nominee," he said of McCain. "But he was right then, and he's wrong now." McCain has said he supports extending the tax cuts, which he initially voted against, because the economy is struggling and tax reductions offer some stimulus.
Obama has proposed an array of subsidies for higher education, health care and other costs hitting middle-class families. He said he believes he can pay for such plans by closing tax loopholes, placing a new tax on carbon emissions, phasing out the Iraq war and ending the Bush tax cuts for the nation's highest earners.
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http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,1722041,00.html