Following up on an item<\/a> from yesterday, John McCain has said, repeatedly and on the record, that he would never consider raising payroll taxes as part of a Social Security reform effort. Asked if there are “any circumstances” in which he would consider this, even as part of negotiations with congressional Democrats, McCain said, “No. None. None<\/a>.”<\/p>\n Over the weekend, McCain said the exact opposite<\/a>, explaining that a payroll tax increase is on the table, much to the consternation<\/a> of conservative activists.<\/p>\n Trying to tamp down on a potential controversy, Tucker Bounds, McCain’s chief spokesperson, went on Fox News yesterday to insist that voters should ignore<\/a> what they heard McCain tell a national television audience 48 hours earlier.<\/p>\n KELLY: You’re off point. We’re talking on a go-forward basis. McCain gets in the White House, is he going to raise the payroll tax? Might the Social Security tax go up? Is that on the table?<\/p>\n BOUNDS: No Megyn there is no imaginable circumstance where John McCain would raise payroll taxes. It’s absolutely out of the question.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Got that? On Sunday, McCain said a payroll tax increase could be part of a negotiation. On Tuesday, McCain’s spokesperson said a payroll tax increase is “absolutely out of the question.”<\/p>\n And who should we believe? McCain or the person McCain hired to speak on behalf of his campaign? If recent history is any guide, it’s the latter. After the Tax Policy Center released a report showing a $2.8 trillion gap between Sen. John McCain’s (R-AZ) public economic proposals and his advisers’ private assurances, top econ adviser Douglas Holtz-Eakin told Slate that just because McCain says something publicly about a policy, “that doesn’t mean it’s official.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n More recently, McCain said he supports an Arizona measure to do away with affirmative action, a reversal of his previous position. Asked about the flip-flop, the McCain campaign refused to say<\/a> if McCain actually supports the Arizona ballot measure, despite the fact that we’d just heard McCain says he does support it. The message was fairly obvious — just because McCain said it, doesn’t mean that this is his actual position on the issue.<\/p>\n Now, we have yet another example. On Sunday, McCain is open to raising the payroll tax. On Tuesday, his campaign insists McCain is open to no such thing.<\/p>\n Let this be a lesson to all of us — if we want to better understand John McCain’s policies, we should overlook what John McCain says about his policies. McCain’s “official” positions don’t always come from McCain.<\/p>\n How are voters to know the difference? When McCain announces a position, how is the public to know whether it’s “official” or one of the policies he doesn’t really mean?<\/p>\n
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\nWhen the Tax Policy Center reported on a disconnect between the economic policies espoused by the candidate and the economic policies espoused by the campaign, McCain aides effectively said we should ignore the candidate<\/a>.<\/p>\n