Jonathan Weisman Strikes Again!
Ah. Page A1 of the Post. The death spiral continues:
McCain Offers Tax Policies He Once Opposed: Now that he is the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, however, McCain is marching straight down the party line. The economic package he has laid out embraces many of the tax policies he once decried: extending Bush's tax cuts he voted against, offering investment tax breaks he once believed would have little economic benefit and granting the long-held wishes of tax lobbyists he has often mocked....
To supporters, McCain has simply seen the light and now understands the power that business tax relief has to spur economic growth and innovation. Said J.D. Foster, a former Bush White House and Treasury tax policy expert, now at the Heritage Foundation: "It's logical that he wouldn't be repeating the arguments he made then. We all learn from experience."
To critics, it is political pandering. "It's just part of the new John McCain that's taking on the conventional wisdom that in tight races, you have to energize the base and win by 50.000001 percent," Chafee said. "I was frankly surprised that he's kept it up after securing the nomination. I thought he'd move to the center, and I haven't seen it"...
First time I have ever seen anybody describe J.D. Foster as a tax policy "expert." Lobbyist, yes. Apparatchik, yes. Ideologue, yes. But expert? Never seen that before...
Why oh why can't we have a better press corps?
