CBS This Morning journalists on Monday uncritically promoted Bernie Sanders’s plan to make college “free” and that his contention that such an idea isn’t “radical.” The segment allowed no contrasting voices. Instead, co-host Norah O’Donnell hyped, “In Iowa, Sunday, he highlighted his plan to lower student loan interest rates and make public colleges tuition free.”
She then featured Sanders declaring, “Now people say, 'Well, that's a nice idea, Santa Claus. What else do you have to offer?' You know how we're going to pay for it? We're going to pay for it by imposing a tax on Wall Street speculation.”
Sanders boasted, “None of this stuff is radical! None of it is pie in the sky! The issue is not that I am being too idealistic. The issue is whether or not we have the courage.”
In an earlier segment, O’Donnell explained the socialist’s appeal this way: “The reason people are responding to this campaign is because they are angry out there.”
While the journalist allowed Sanders to favorably spin his plans, Forbes.com offered a stark explanation:
While Sanders describes his top rate as 52 percent, top-bracket taxpayers would be paying up to 58 percent rate (the 52 percent base rate, plus the 2.2 percent health premium, plus the Affordable Care Act’s 3.8 percent surtax on investment income, which Sanders would keep).
Sanders estimates the employer tax would raise $630 billion annually, the individual income tax hike would bring in about $210 billion, the rate hikes on ordinary income would raise $110 billion, and the tax hikes on capital gains and other investment income would bring in $92 billion. That’s a $1 trillion-a-year tax hike.
How big is that? Well, the federal government expects to collect an average of about $4 trillion a year in revenues over the next decade. A $1 trillion tax hike on a $4 trillion base is really big.
A transcript of the segment is below:
CBS TM
1/25/16
8:04
NORAH O’DONNELL: One week before the Iowa caucuses, the CBS News battleground tracker shows Donald Trump in front in the state's GOP race. The poll finds trump leading Ted Cruz 39 to 34 percent. Marco Rubio is the only other candidate in double digits. Our battleground tracker finds Bernie Sanders one point ahead of Hillary Clinton in the Iowa Democratic contest. But twice as many voters say Clinton's policies are realistic.
CHARLIE ROSE: The former Secretary of State is criticizing Sanders, saying she is the candidate who can get things done. Sanders calls the Clinton campaign desperate. In Iowa, Sunday, he highlighted his plan to lower student loan interest rates and make public colleges tuition-free.
BERNIE SANDERS: Now people say, “Well, that's a nice idea, Santa Claus. What else do you have to offer?” You know who is going to pay for it? By imposing a tax on Wall Street speculation. None of this stuff is radical! None of it is pie in the sky! The issue is not that I am being too idealistic. The issue is whether or not we have the courage. That is what this campaign is about.
ROSE: The Democrats will share the stage tonight at a televised town hall forum in Des Moines.
