"The Straight Talk Express lost a wheel on that one," Obama responded. He said repeatedly that his own plan would raise taxes only on those making more than $250,000 a year and that it would result in a lower tax bill for 95% of working Americans.
The candidates also differed when asked by Brokaw to list their priorities. McCain said he would tackle healthcare, energy and entitlement reform all at once. "We're not rifle shots here," McCain said. "We are Americans. We can, with the participation of all Americans, work together and solve these problems together."
Obama said the next president would have to set priorities and defer some projects, "just like a family has to prioritize." First up would be a new plan for energy independence, he said. Revamping healthcare would be his second undertaking, followed by education.
The candidates jousted over their healthcare plans. Obama wants to build on the existing system, providing subsidies for those who cannot afford coverage. He said McCain would, for the first time, tax workers for the coverage they receive from their employers and strip states of their power to bar insurers from denying coverage for preexisting conditions or prenatal care.
McCain, who favors a $5,000 tax credit to let Americans shop for healthcare, said Obama's plan would fine those who don't get adequate coverage. "The point is that we have got to give people choice in America and not mandate things on them," McCain said.
Each accused the other of distorting his position.
The candidates were asked to lay out their doctrines for handling humanitarian crises in which U.S. security is not at issue. Obama said the U.S. has a moral responsibility to intervene in such cases.
"When genocide is happening, when ethnic cleansing is happening somewhere in the world, and we stand idly by, that diminishes us," Obama said. He added that the U.S. needed to enlist its allies for help in such cases given the level of "cruelty around the world. . . . We're not going to be everywhere all the time," he said.
McCain used the question to draw an implicit contrast with Obama about who would be the better commander in chief. A president needs to understand what "the limits of our capability are," he said. One question he said a president must ask is whether committing U.S. troops will "beneficially affect the situation."
"That requires a cool hand at the tiller," McCain added, one of several times he challenged Obama's judgment.
