In a
debate Monday night, Maine Gov. Paul LePage took a moment to weep for the poor Mainers making a mere $100,000 a year. Rep. Mike Michaud, LePage's Democratic opponent, had pointed out that "budgets are about priorities. The governor made a priority to do huge tax cuts to the wealthiest one percent of Mainers." LePage capped his response with this:
$100,000 or greater. Those are the richest people in Maine, folks, and I don't know how many of you are making $100,000, but it's not that rich.
Two points need to be made. First of all, it's blazingly dishonest to suggest that $100,000 puts you in the top one percent of Maine's income distribution. In fact, in 2012 it took a household income of
more than $250,000 to put you in the top five percent in Maine. So LePage's sleight-of-hand shifting from Michaud's point about tax cuts for the wealthiest one percent—who got
an average $2,770 tax cut in 2011 thanks to LePage—to "$100,000 or greater. Those are the richest people in Maine, folks" is ... can I just say blazingly dishonest again?
Second, while $100,000 is not actually in Maine's top one percent, the state's median household income is below $47,000. So I'm guessing that most of Maine would not hear that $100,000 is not that rich and be like "oh, poor babies, they're hardly making more than double the median income, let's give them a giant tax cut right this minute."
This is classic Paul LePage: He's simultaneously being dishonest about exactly who is in the top one percent and being tone deaf to how much his average constituent earns. But of course, $100,000 probably isn't so much to the average Paul LePage voter, and those are the people he needs to please.
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LePage squeaked through a three-way race in 2010, and it's once again a tight three-way race. A guy with the support of such a small proportion of voters should not be able to do this much damage. But if Democrats don't turn out to vote on November 4, he may get that chance.