McCain is going to cut spending
Even if he does, it's not going to be by near enough to fund his tax cuts. Take a look at the CBO estimates - he'd need to cut the federal budget by over a third to get it back in the black and even by eliminating the programs he's only said he'll start up committees to "look at" there wouldn't be close to enough there. To put it simply, he'd have to pull out of Iraq and Afghanistan immediately, disband about a quarter of the military, eliminate social security completely and axe a whole bunch of other stuff (yes, I made that up on the spot, let me know if you have a better plan for dropping a third off the budget). Do you seriously believe he's going to go anywhere near that?
Obama's not clear either, but at least his proposals involve letting the tax cuts expire and hiking the higher tax brackets to pay for his proposals. That's one hell of a lot more financially responsible than the McCain idea of making the Bush budget blowouts look like stealing a nickel from petty cash.
As for Palin, I think we're all agreed that she's lying or misrepresenting the actual facts. She certainly didn't send any money back, which is what the "Thanks but no thanks" line implies - she quite happily accepted the earmark even though the actual target of the earmark was significantly broadened.
On
pork spending, Biden is #62 and Obama is #70, which are both excellent records (Kula's #2 for Biden is straight up misreading stats), but nothing on McCain who has no pork at all which is very commendable. Palin, however, comes from a State which is #1 on the pork spending records and who is actually proud of the amount of money she's earmarked for her constituents while in Alaska. Senator Stevens from Alaska - someone who Palin could very well have told "thanks but no thanks" for earmarks manages to come in at #2 on the pork spending, so it's utterly futile to say Palin has anything commendable at all in her record on government waste.
McCain's campaign is making an art form of the blatant lie. Palin's lying in her pretense of cutting spending. McCain's lying whenever he talks about his track record with the Bush administration. The campaign already had one ad completely withdrawn for blatant lying and then made another ad (the teaching sex one) which is even more blatant a lie. If there's one thing that tells me, it's a McCain presidency would lie, cheat and do anything else necessary to do whatever it wanted. Definitely not a change from the current crowd at all.
On the other hand, Obama is definitely your classic tax-and-spend democrat. He's all about social programs and a big friendly government, and really makes no apologies for it (nor should he - it's what he believes in).
Take your pick.
Dd
