From Salon
By Justin Jouvenal

As gas and food prices soar and job losses mount, John McCain launched a new effort this week to reassure Americans that he has a plan to bring back economic growth. McCain spoke at a town-hall event in Denver Monday and will travel to the swing states of Ohio and Pennsylvania on Wednesday and Michigan and Wisconsin on Thursday and Friday to spread his economic message.

The economy has vaulted past Iraq and terrorism as the most pressing concern on voters’ minds this election season, and both McCain and Barack Obama are trying to show they feel voters’ pain. McCain has called for help for those facing mortgage foreclosures and has pledged to balance the federal budget by 2013. But the centerpiece of his economic plan is a tax-cut proposal more sweeping than anything envisioned by George W. Bush.

“The choice in this election is stark and simple,” McCain said at the Denver town hall. “Senator Obama will raise your taxes. I won’t. I will cut them where I can.”

But according to a respected, independent group of tax-policy experts, McCain’s plan would balloon the deficit and provide a windfall to the wealthy while affording only nominal relief to middle-class taxpayers. McCain has moved toward the Republican base on a handful of issues this campaign season, but his tax plan might actually shift the erstwhile deficit hawk to the right of the current president.

Read more Radical Tax Plan