John McCain and Sarah Palin may have no compunctions about stretching the truth to meet their short term goals. But every time they attempt to gain a tactical advantage, they manage to paint themselves into an embarrassing strategic corner. Take health care reform. First, Sarah Palin unveils the McCain-Palin revenue neutral tax credit during her debate with Joe Biden. Too good to be true? Well, yes, there is that sticky matter of a massive middle-class tax increase on employee health benefits purchased by employers. But, no, that won't make the tax credit revenue neutral. To balance the budget, a senior McCain policy advisor told the Wall Street Journal that McCain "always planned to fund the tax credits, in part, with savings from Medicare and Medicaid," federally funded programs that provide health care to seniors, poor families, and the disabled. Cut Medicare to pay for a $130,000,000,000 a year shell game. Just what the doctor ordered.
Does this admission represent a sudden burst of honesty? Or are McCain and Palin so devoid of political insight that they believe threatening Medicare benefits will rally voters to their cause? Is this duo that claims to be ready to run the country incapable of anticipating where their initial misrepresentations would ultimately lead? Seniors vote in disproportionate numbers, and while you may be able to convince some of them that Medicare is a privately administered program, raising the specter of substantial cuts in Medicare benefits is not the way to save a flagging campaign.
I understand how the McCain-Palin health care reform plan can be presented as another victory for the free market economics that brought us the Wall Street meltdown, but do McCain and Palin really think they can spin this assault on working and retired Americans into something the American people will actually buy? In the words of George W. Bush:
"There's an old saying in Tennessee - I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee - that says, fool me once, shame on - shame on you. Fool me - you can't get fooled again."
But three times may not be the charm for which McCain and Palin are hoping.
We've heard a lot about executive experience these past few weeks. About how the Governor of Alaska is the only one of the four candidates for national office that has any. About how the junior Senator from Illinois may be able to run a campaign, but could you trust him to manage our nation. About how real executives struggle with follow-up questions but know how to talk directly to television cameras. About why character assassination is more important than fixing the economy.
According to McCain and Palin, it's bad policy to tell a foreign power that if it permits terrorists to hide behind its borders, the United States will take unilateral military action to root out those terrorists. On the other hand, do they really believe that it's good policy to threaten the health benefits of working and retired American citizens?
John McCain and Sarah Palin want this election to be about a fictional villain who threatens to destroy the American dream for us and our children. Barack Obama and Joe Biden want this election to be about preserving the American dream for generations to come. If you don't believe this, just take a careful look at their competing plans to deal with America's health care crisis.