ST. CLAIR SHORES, Mich. — Joe Biden threw his hardest punches yet at John McCain on Monday, linking the Republican presidential candidate to the economic policies of the Bush administration, describing him as out of touch with middle-class Americans and claiming he is in the pocket of big oil and other corporations.
“John McCain doesn’t seem to understand what middle-class people are going through today,” Biden said at a campaign stop. “I don’t doubt that he cares. He just doesn’t think that we have any responsibility to help people who are hurting.
“My dad used to have an expression: Don’t tell me what you value. Show me your budget, and Ill tell you what you value. By that measure, John McCain doesn’t stand with the middle class. He stands with George Bush firmly in the corner of the wealthy and well-connected,” Biden said.
Barack Obama’s Democratic running mate said McCain supported tax breaks for the nation’s largest oil companies, despite Exxon-Mobil CEO Rex Tillerson’s testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee that the company doesn’t need tax breaks to explore for oil.
“John McCain is so firmly in their corner, he thinks the Exxon-Mobils of the world should get an additional $4 billion dollars a year in tax cuts,” Biden said.
The Delaware senator said when President Bush ran for office, he pledged to be a reformer who would cross the political aisle to work with Democrats. He said Bush failed to do so, and the outcome is a record number of home foreclosures, tumbling home values and the collapse of the nation’s largest financial institutions.
McCain, who has voted with Bush 90 percent of the time, would offer more of the same, Biden said.
“Just as George Herbert Walker Bush was nicknamed ‘Bush 41′ and his son is known as ‘Bush 43,’ John McCain could easily become known as ‘Bush 44,’” he said.
Repeating a key Democratic theme, Biden cast McCain as a Bush clone.
“We’ve seen this movie before, folks,” he said. “But as everyone knows, the sequel is always worse than the original.
Biden’s attack was aimed at knocking McCain’s surge in the polls since he named Sarah Palin as his running mate. The presidential race intensified last week after the McCain campaign accused Barack Obama of calling Sarah Palin a pig when he described McCain’s policies as “lipstick on a pig.”
The Obama campaign fired back with an ad mocking McCain for admitting that he doesn’t know how to use a computer and another Monday charging McCain with running a dishonorable campaign.
Biden, who has been tasked with providing the campaign’s most biting hits on McCain, offered several examples of McCain’s votes, saying the Arizona senator supported Bush’s failed proposal to privatize Social Security, opposed a GI bill that will give veterans more money for college regardless of the length of their service and wanted to tax employer-provided health care as income.
Borrowing from the Democratic playbook, Biden hailed McCain’s military service before ripping his political record.
“America needs more than a brave soldier. America needs a wise leader,” he said, getting a roar from the crowd.
“John McCain doesn’t seem to understand what middle-class people are going through today,” Biden said at a campaign stop. “I don’t doubt that he cares. He just doesn’t think that we have any responsibility to help people who are hurting.
“My dad used to have an expression: Don’t tell me what you value. Show me your budget, and Ill tell you what you value. By that measure, John McCain doesn’t stand with the middle class. He stands with George Bush firmly in the corner of the wealthy and well-connected,” Biden said.
Barack Obama’s Democratic running mate said McCain supported tax breaks for the nation’s largest oil companies, despite Exxon-Mobil CEO Rex Tillerson’s testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee that the company doesn’t need tax breaks to explore for oil.
“John McCain is so firmly in their corner, he thinks the Exxon-Mobils of the world should get an additional $4 billion dollars a year in tax cuts,” Biden said.
The Delaware senator said when President Bush ran for office, he pledged to be a reformer who would cross the political aisle to work with Democrats. He said Bush failed to do so, and the outcome is a record number of home foreclosures, tumbling home values and the collapse of the nation’s largest financial institutions.
McCain, who has voted with Bush 90 percent of the time, would offer more of the same, Biden said.
“Just as George Herbert Walker Bush was nicknamed ‘Bush 41′ and his son is known as ‘Bush 43,’ John McCain could easily become known as ‘Bush 44,’” he said.
Repeating a key Democratic theme, Biden cast McCain as a Bush clone.
“We’ve seen this movie before, folks,” he said. “But as everyone knows, the sequel is always worse than the original.
Biden’s attack was aimed at knocking McCain’s surge in the polls since he named Sarah Palin as his running mate. The presidential race intensified last week after the McCain campaign accused Barack Obama of calling Sarah Palin a pig when he described McCain’s policies as “lipstick on a pig.”
The Obama campaign fired back with an ad mocking McCain for admitting that he doesn’t know how to use a computer and another Monday charging McCain with running a dishonorable campaign.
Biden, who has been tasked with providing the campaign’s most biting hits on McCain, offered several examples of McCain’s votes, saying the Arizona senator supported Bush’s failed proposal to privatize Social Security, opposed a GI bill that will give veterans more money for college regardless of the length of their service and wanted to tax employer-provided health care as income.
Borrowing from the Democratic playbook, Biden hailed McCain’s military service before ripping his political record.
“America needs more than a brave soldier. America needs a wise leader,” he said, getting a roar from the crowd.
