Originally Posted by
The Bare Knuckled Pundit
-Increased federal gas taxes:
Sounds good...
-Accelerated increases in Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFÉ) standards:
Sounds good...
-Consumer tax credits for hybrid vehicles:
Concept good over all, but I would personally restrict it to the cost of the vehicle being written off over three years and would not include maintenance.
-Hybrid infrastructure expansion:
As long as this is paid for by the gas tax increase you mentioned, then no problem with this one.
-Increased regulation and oversight of energy futures markets:
This one... big disagreement. Speculation is not the friggin problem. That is pure bullshit spin from the media and politicians. It has always been there. No one was bitching when oil was priced at a discount to fair value in 1999. THAT too was due to speculation. It is a way for people and companies to hedge their portfolios against future expected increases/decreases in the underlying commodities. You want to see speculation's effect reverse from a premium to a discount, then work towards increasing energy supply. Over regulating our markets will only lead to a competitive disadvantage for those that don't/can't shift their futures trading overseas.
-Creation of the American Energy Innovation Awards program:
Sounds good....
-Increased funding for the Advanced Research Project Agency – Energy (ARPA-E):
Sounds good.... until....
-Passage of a tariff on imported oil:
This is a really dumb and dangerous idea. You put tariffs on imported oil, other countries retaliate with tariffs on our products. Just include this with the increase in the gas tax.
-Establishment of the Western Hemispheric Energy Cooperation Council:
Not a bad idea.
!
Mostly good ideas. Only a couple I had a problem with.
Quote from Cypress:
"Scientists don't use "averages". Maybe armchair supertools on message boards ascribe some meaning to "averages" between two random data points. And maybe clueless amatuers "draw a straight line" through two random end data points to define a "trend". Experts don't.
They use mean annual and five year means in trend analysis. Don't tell me I have to explain the difference to you. "
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