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A Project of The Annenberg Public Policy Center

Issues: government spending

Big Spender?

October 7, 2008

McCain once again attacked Obama for proposing new spending, putting the figure at more than $860 billion. But at the same time, McCain himself began the debate by proposing a new spending program, to buy up troubled mortgages directly from homeowners and replace them with 30-year loans guaranteed by the government. McCain’s campaign e-mailed reporters with the following cost estimate:

McCain press release: The direct cost of this plan would be roughly $300 billion because the purchase of mortgages would relieve homeowners of “negative equity”

More on that $860 billion

October 7, 2008

McCain said that Obama has proposed $860 billion in new spending. That’s based on a McCain campaign estimate of how much Obama’s new proposals will cost, without figuring in any savings or reductions in spending. Any increase in funding and any created program counts as “new spending” in this estimate, whether or not it is offset by decreases in spending elsewhere. A more traditional, and arguably more useful, measure of spending is how much a given candidate’s proposals will increase the federal deficit.

McCain’s $6.8 Billion Boast

October 7, 2008

McCain repeated a questionable boast when he said, “I saved the taxpayers $6.8 billion” by reining in a defense contract.
As we mentioned in our analysis of the first debate, there is more to the story. McCain certainly did lead a fight to kill the contract, and the effort ended in prison sentences for defense contractors. The contract is still up in the air, however, and questions have been raised about the role McCain played in helping a Boeing rival secure the new contract.

Fact-Checking…’The View’?

September 12, 2008

We generally don’t take it upon ourselves to parse ABC’s morning gabfest. But we noticed that when the chat turned to Palin’s record on earmarks McCain got it wrong.
He was correct on one point: Palin vetoed $500 million in spending as governor. She axed over $230 million in state spending in 2007. And the Anchorage Daily News reported that she lopped off another $268 million in spending for 2008.
But then the ladies shot back with this:

Barbara Walters: She also took some earmark spending.

Pork-barrel Spending

December 29, 2007

Q: What percentage of the national spending is pork?
A: About 1 percent.

‘Outrageous’ Exaggerations

November 20, 2007

Republican presidential candidate John McCain cites three absurd-sounding examples of pork-barrel spending in a recent ad. But he appears to have chosen these three because they’re easy to mock, not because he had significant involvement in removing them from the budget.