The Stupidity of a Gas Tax "Holiday"
“Hillary Clinton has decided to line up with John McCain in pushing to suspend the federal excise tax on gasoline, 18.4 cents a gallon, for this summer’s travel season. This is not an energy policy. This is money laundering: we borrow money from China and ship it to Saudi Arabia and take a little cut for ourselves as it goes through our gas tanks. What a way to build our country.”
How can McCain and Clinton be so ignorant. Yes, it would be nice to have lower gas prices during summer, but at what price to the environment and economy. If anything they should increase the tax as a deterrent like Iowa did with cigarettes. I thought the cigarette tax was a great idea because it a) deterred smokers with increased price and b) used the extra tax to fund smoking cessation projects and the rest went to other worthwhile causes. There has to be a point monetarily at which the American public will start looking at alternative transportation and maybe an additional gas tax is the answer. That said, I realize America is hooked on oil worse than a junkie on meth, but we have to come to the realization sometime that the oil will not last forever and bite the bullet. We’ve already screwed ourselves so many times over on oil, energy, and the environment to line some CEO’s pockets, can we please just once look past the shiny and tempting allure of cheap gas and do something to help our future?