Obama attacks McCain's 'George Bush policies'

Republican John McCain’s economic plan “amounts to a full-throated endorsement of George Bush’s policies”, his Democratic presidential rival Barack Obama said today.

Mr Obama was seeking to highlight the record-high fuel prices in the US, an increase in job losses, and Mr Bush’s consistently low approval ratings and suggested Mr McCain simply offered more of the same.

He will face Mr McCain in November’s general election to decide who will be the 44th president of the United States.

Repeatedly linking Mr McCain to Mr Bush, Mr Obama told around 900 people in Raleigh, North Carolina: “Our president sacrificed investments in health care, and education, and energy, and infrastructure on the altar of tax breaks for big corporations and wealthy CEOs.”

The 46-year-old Illinois senator criticised Mr McCain for originally opposing Mr Bush’s first-term tax cuts but now supporting their continuation.

He said he would increase taxes on oil companies while Mr McCain would reduce them.

“At a time when we’re fighting two wars, when millions of Americans can’t afford their medical bills or their tuition bills, when we’re paying more than four dollars a gallon for gas, the man who rails against government spending wants to spend 1.2 billion dollars (£600 million) on a tax break for Exxon Mobil,” Mr Obama said.

“That isn’t just irresponsible. It’s outrageous.”

It was Mr Obama’s first campaign event since his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton suspended her campaign and endorsed him at the weekend.

Mr Obama did not offer any new policies today, but stressed that his plans include raising income taxes on wealthy Americans, granting a 1,000 dollar (£500) tax cut to most others, winding down the Iraq war, tightening credit card regulations and pumping more money into education, alternative fuels and infrastructure such as roads and bridges.

Mr Obama highlighted that the average price of fuel in the US has just passed the four dollars a gallon mark for the first time.

He also called for greater government investments “in a renewable energy policy that ends our addiction on foreign oil, provides real long-term relief from high fuel costs, and builds a green economy that could create up to five million well-paying jobs that can’t be outsourced”.

He did not mention nuclear power, although in the past he has said he would not rule out a greater role for nuclear energy.

Speaking at a fundraiser in Richmond, Virginia, Mr McCain continued his support of a temporary suspension of the federal fuel tax, widely criticised by economists – and Mr Obama.

“Talk to somebody who owns a couple of trucks and makes a living with those trucks,” Mr McCain said.

“Ask them whether they’d like to have some relief – 18.5 cents per gallon for gasoline and 24.5 cents for diesel. They say it matters.”

On energy production, when a donor in Richmond summed up his advice as “nuclear, and drill wherever we’ve got it”, Mr McCain said: “You just gave my speech. Thank you, my friend.”

He said: “Long-term, we’ve got to become used to nuclear, wind, solar, tide, all of the alternate energy, including a battery that will take a car 100 miles or 200 miles” before being recharged.

He went on: “Nuclear power, for all kinds of reasons, needs to be part of the solution.”