Exclusive: McCain hits Obama on taxes, Iraq


By JOHN DISTASO, New Hampshire Union Leader
June 13, 2008

After accusations by Barack Obama supporters and advisers that he is confused" and confusing" on Iraq, John McCain hit back hard today.

It's a very clear choice," McCain told UnionLeader.com following his appearance in Nashua this afternoon.

There is nothing confusing about (Obama's) lack of knowledge and experience and judgment on this issue, and the fact that he was simply wrong," McCain said.

He even still refuses to acknowledge that the surge is winning," McCain said. Remarkable."

Before McCain arrived for a town hall meeting on the campus of Daniel Webster College in Nashua, Rep. Paul Hodes, D-N.H., and Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., cited a finding by the Tax Policy Center that 80 percent of his proposed tax cuts would go to the top 10 percent ofincome earners while Obama's tax cuts for the middle class would be three times larger than McCain's cuts for the same group.

Hodes called it a Bush-McCain extension of rewarding the wealthy," and said, It is time for people making more than $250,000 a year to pay a fair share of taxes."

McCain told UnionLeader.com the Tax Policy Center is a well-known left-wing think tank.

The facts are that Senator Obama wants to raise people's taxes," he said. He wants to raise the capital gains tax and he wants to raise the tax on Social Security for middle-income Americans," McCain said.

He wants to raise taxes and I want to keep taxes low - on every American," said McCain. And his proposal to raise capital gains taxes and to raise the cap on Social Security I am convinced would be devastating to our economy."

McCain also said he was disappointed in the U.S. Supreme Court's 5-4 ruling that foreign terrorist suspects being held at Guantanamo Bay have a constitutional right to challenge their detention in civilian courts on the American mainland.

McCain has called for the closing of Guantanamo Bay, but said, These are not citizens and are enemy combatants, so I worry about the difficulties of having a situation where the military has the role that they should play. And some of these people, like Khalid Shiekh Mohammed, are very bad guys, really evil people.

We're going to have to try to make the proper adjustments," McCain said, and, hopefully, we will move forward with a process that will make sure that these people are now allowed to re-enter the world since they remain dedicated to our destruction and everything we stand for and believe in."

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