I noticed a big score for Dean tonight. At every debate, in attack ads and in every campaign speech, Kerry has pummeled Dean by saying that Dean wants to raise middle class taxes by eliminating the Bush tax cuts. When Dean is there (at debates), he points out that the middle class did not get a tax cut because Bush's cuts to services, especially No Child Left Behind, health care, special ed, and higher ed, have raised property taxes, payroll taxes, insurance premiums and college tuitions so that the average family pays far more than they did before the Bush cuts. Kerry then puts on his mock outrage and says, "come on, what are you thinking?" Or he says something like, "not according to Hector Garcia, a mechanic from Dubuque who saved 1800 dollars this year!" Or, he mocks Dean, by saying, "the middle class tax cut, which Howard somehow doesn't realize people ever got..."

Well, today in Daschle's post-State of the Union speech, he took a paragraph almost word-for word out of Dean's stump speech, pointing out that the middle class did not get a tax cut for all the reasons stated above. In the next debate, if Kerry tries his BS routine, Dean can just say "your own leader in the Senate, Tom Daschle, said it himself last week. It's really not that hard to understand, John!" Personally, I'm hoping this will happen!