Each week, the Spinnaker will be keeping you up-to-date on the 2008 presidential election: who’s leading in the latest polls and where they stand on key political issues.
Sen. Barack Obama has moved outside the margin of error and is now leading Sen. John McCain by 6.2 percent, according to the Reuters/C-Span/Zogby poll tracking. John Zogby, president and chief executive of Zogby International, visited campus to speak to a political science class and also addressed the student body at the University Center Oct. 14.
DEMOCRAT
Barack Obama
49%
REPUBLICAN
John McCain
43%
Source: Zogby.
Election notes
• Sen. John McCain unveiled a $52.5 billion economic proposal. The proposal consisted of a 50 percent reduction in capital gains taxes, an acceleration in the tax write-off for stock losses, which allows tax-payers to deduct up to $15,000, and a lower tax rate for those 59-years and older who withdraw money from an IRA or a 401(k) retirement plan.
• Sen. Barack Obama proposed a several-point plan Oct. 13 to address the economic crises, calling for temporary but costly new programs. The proposal calls for a $3,000 tax deduction for employers who hire new employees, the elimination of income taxes on unemployment benefits, doubling loan guarantees to automakers to $50 billion and a new mechanism that will allow the Federal Reserve to loan money to state and local governments.
• Libertarian Presidential candidate Bob Barr in a stump speech Oct. 14 lambasted both the Obama and McCain campaigns: “[We need to] get down to the real business of deciding whether or not these men and women are qualified to sit across the table from the leader of an adversarial nation that clearly does not have our interests at heart or in mind, whether or not they are equipped, at least philosophically, to understand the complex issues involving the 21st century economy that we are in.”
Presidential Election Countdown: 20 days until the election Nov. 4.
Compiled by James Cannon II.
