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All's welfare

Posted by Sasha Issenberg October 17, 2008 05:38 PM

MELBOURNE, Fla. -- When Bill Clinton signed a Republican welfare-reform bill in 1995, he did not only "end welfare as we know it" but appeared to kill one of the issues the GOP liked to invoke when caricaturing its opponents as big-city liberals.

In two Florida stops today, John McCain exhumed "welfare," a term Democrats once saw as a wedge issue used in racially-charged appeals to white swing voters, as he criticized the fact that individuals who do not pay taxes would qualify for refundable credits proposed by Barack Obama.

“That’s not a tax cut, that’s welfare," McCain said.

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