Obama, Clinton at it on Social Security
Posted: Wednesday, January 16, 2008 4:54 PM by Domenico Montanaro
From NBC/NJ’s Aswini Anburajan
HENDERSON, Nev. -- Last night's debate may have put some arguments between the Democratic candidates to rest, but Obama reprised an old one this morning, hitting Clinton on social security.
Obama told the crowd that they may be receiving a mailer from Senator Clinton that contrasts his plan with hers, but the Senator appears to have muddled the language of the actual attack.
"Some of you may have been getting these, a flier lately from Senator Clinton's campaign that says that they are gonna solve Social Security just by showing fiscal responsibility and Obama is going to initiate a trillion-dollar tax cut on hard working families."
What he appeared to be referring to was a Clinton attack on his call to raise the cap on the payroll tax for social security. Currently, Americans only pay social security taxes on the first $97,000 of income.
A recent Clinton mailer in Nevada shows Obama and Clinton side-by-side. The mailer says Clinton has a "blue print to rebuild the road to middle class prosperity," adding that she will provide tax relief to middle class Americans and "address social security without putting burdens on hard working families or seniors."
Next to Obama's picture the headline reads, "A Plan With a Trillion Dollar Tax Increase on America's Hard Working Families." It goes on to quote Obama saying that the best way to address social security would be to raise the cap on the payroll tax and "send more of Nevada families' hard earned dollars to Washington."
Addressing raising the cap on the payroll tax, Obama said, "We might exempt sort of middle folks from maybe $97K up to 200K or there might be some exemptions, but once people are making over $200-250K, they can afford to pay a little more in payroll tax."
"So this is what I proposed -- this is what Sen. Clinton is calling a trillion-dollar cut on hard-working Americans," Obama continued, repeating his mistake on labeling the tax increase a tax cut.
He went on to say that Senator Clinton thinks that the top three percent of wage earners in this country were "middle-class Americans."
"By the way, one last point I want to make about this -- what's worse is, Senator Clinton when she was on rope line in Iowa, somebody asked her about this,” he said, “she proposed the same, she said she’d be open to the same plan that I just offered. But now is sending out a flier calling this a trillion-dollar tax cut."
