Dark Bilious Vapors

Apropos of an earlier post (which generated a comment from Mike "Half-Bakered" Hollihan, my favorite conservative (a high compliment coming from me, even if Mike doesn't realize that :-) ), I was interested in seeing this post from fellow Rocky Top Brigade member Manish, the Damn Foreigner:

To which I say, what's wrong with high gas prices? While we're at it, lets raise taxes on gasoline. As the President's economic advisor Gregory Mankiw once said:

Cutting income taxes while increasing gasoline taxes would lead to more rapid economic growth, less traffic congestion, safer roads, and reduced risk of global warming--all without jeopardizing long-term fiscal solvency. This may be the closest thing to a free lunch that economics has to offer.

Dick Cheney wanted to increase gas taxes at one time.

In October 1986, when Dick Cheney was the lone congressman from energy-rich Wyoming, he introduced legislation to create a new import tax that would have caused the price of oil, and ultimately the price of gasoline paid by drivers, to soar by billions of dollars per year.

"Let us rid ourselves of the fiction that low oil prices are somehow good for the United States," Mr. Cheney, who is now vice president, said shortly after introducing the legislation.

[My emphasis --LRC]

Len on 06.06.04 @ 11:02 AM CST