Elizabeth Holmes reports from Orlando on the presidential race.

Barack Obama has long aligned John McCain with President Bush, hoping the president’s low approval ratings will drag down his White House rival. But on Thursday, McCain tried his hand at reverse psychology—suggesting it’s Obama who would continue the economic policies of the Bush administration.

“Barack Obama’s only answer is to double-down on the Bush Administration’s legacy of out-of-control-spending,” McCain said in a statement in response to reports that 478,000 Americans claimed unemployment benefits this week, an increase of 15,000 from the week before.

The new charge from McCain that Obama and Bush are close ideologically on economic policy matters hangs on the thread of proposed spending increases by Obama. However, Obama opposes most major aspects of Bush’s economic legacy, including making permanent the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, which McCain supports.

In his statement today, McCain said that Obama’s plan is “a time-proven recipe for turning tough economic times into terrible economic circumstances.”

Obama spokesman Tommy Vietor brushed off the suggestion. “The fact is, over the course of 20 months of campaigning and three debates, McCain hasn’t offered a single thing that he would do differently from George W. Bush on the economy or foreign policy,” he said.