Matthews mischaracterized polls showing people trust Democrats on taxes and claimed "nobody has ever accused the Democrats of tax cutting"Summary: Continuing to mischaracterize polls showing that the public prefers Democrats over Republicans on handling taxes, Chris Matthews acknowledged that "the latest polling shows that people trust Democrats more" on taxes, but still stated that the polls referred to "tax cutting" and suggested that the results were surprising because "nobody has ever accused the Democrats of tax cutting." In fact, the polls asked more broadly about tax policy, not merely "tax cutting," and contrary to Matthews's suggestion that Democrats do not cut taxes, numerous Democrats have enacted or proposed tax cuts in recent years.
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Further, contrary to Matthews's statement that "nobody has ever accused the Democrats of tax cutting," many Democrats have enacted or proposed tax cuts recently.
For example, during his run for president, Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) proposed making middle class tax cuts permanent, advocated for an education tax credit, a 5-percent reduction in corporate tax rates, and tax credits for health insurance, among others. Other recent examples, according to a February 20 Associated Press article, include Gov. Brad Henry's (D-OK) proposal to cut taxes on retirees, Gov. Bill Richardson's (D-NM) proposed income tax cuts, and Gov. Janet Napolitano's (D-AZ) proposal for $100 million in tax cuts for various programs. A 2003 tax plan proposed by Senate Democrats would have given middle-income taxpayers an average tax cut of $542. In 1996, former President Bill Clinton proposed a budget with "about $100 billion in tax cuts for the middle class" according to a March 20, 1996, New York Times article (subscription required). Clinton's budget included a tuition tax deduction of up to $5,000 per family. In 1997, Clinton also signed The Taxpayer Relief Act, a bill cutting taxes by $152 billion, including a $500-per-child tax credit, a cut in the capital gains tax, and additional tax incentives for education.
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http://mediamatters.org/items/200604010002 From a link in the article:
http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/UploadedPDF/1000634_KerryPlan.pdf