At the same time, the certain Republican presidential nominee says Democratic rivals Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton would impose the single largest tax increase since World War II by allowing tax cuts pushed to passage by President Bush to expire.
"Both promise big 'change.' And a trillion dollars in new taxes over the next decade would certainly fit that description," McCain said in remarks prepared for delivery Tuesday. "All these tax increases are the fine print under the slogan of
'hope:' They're going to raise your taxes by thousands of dollars per year
-- and they have the audacity to hope you don't mind."
That was a play on the title of an Obama book.
McCain twice voted against the very tax cuts he now supports; he says failing to extend them would amount to tax increases for millions of people.
The four-term Arizona senator was presenting his proposals -- and blistering his Democratic rivals
-- in a wide-ranging economic speech at Carnegie Mellon University.
It's part of an ongoing effort to counter the notion -- fueled by his own previous comments
-- that he's not as strong on the economy as he is on other issues. He's also seeking to fend off criticism from Democrats, including Obama and Clinton, that his small-government, free-market stances don't mesh with people feeling the pinch
-- particularly those hurting now.
His speech comes a day after he said he believes the country has already entered a recession, a label the Bush administration has resisted even as a credit crisis, a housing slump, soaring energy costs and rising layoffs combined to soften the economy.
To help people weather the downturn immediately, McCain was calling for Congress to institute a "gas-tax holiday" by suspending the 18.4 cent federal gas tax and 24.4 cent diesel tax from Memorial Day to Labor Day. He also renewed his call for the United States to stop adding to the Strategic Petroleum Reserve and thus lessen to some extent the worldwide demand for oil.
