Don’t fall for ‘cap and tax’
May 15th, 2009 by Rick Arms
Barack Obama promised that he wouldn’t raise taxes on anyone making less than $250,000 a year. He neglected to mention that this tax exemption would go only to those who don’t use electricity, gasoline, heating oil or natural gas.
The truth of the matter is that Obama will raise taxes on practically all middle-class Americans. But that’s not all; in addition to new taxes on all those necessities (just think of all the appliances in your home that use electricity), he will drastically reduce our standard of living.
Obama warned during his campaign in Oregon that we can no longer keep our homes set at 72 degrees (warmed in the winter and cooled in the summer), eat whatever foods
we want (if meat and milk products come from cows that have to be fed) and drive SUVs (to accommodate our family and friends). He said we shouldn’t continue to consume 25 percent of the world’s resources when we have only 4 percent of the world’s population.
Why not? Americans have built a free enterprise, private-property, rule-of-law, respect-for-contracts, innovation-receptive society that has enabled us to enjoy the highest standard of living in the world. We designed it by adoption of our unique and long-lasting U.S. Constitution, we worked for it and we paid for it. So, why can’t we enjoy the fruits of our labor?
This increase in our taxes, and decrease in our standard of living, is being sold under the slogan “cap and trade,” which means giving the government the power to put a cap on the amount of carbon dioxide emissions created by the production of electricity, gasoline and heating oil. This forces businesses to buy permits for the emissions they are allowed. The process should be called “cap and tax”: a cap in our standard of living and a tax (an increase in cost) on our use of products whose manufacturer emits CO2.
The Obama administration
hopes that increased energy costs will force us to shift away from the use of fossil fuels to various alternatives. To nuclear plants? The left won’t tolerate that.
To windmills and solar panels to capture wind and sun? They now provide less than 1 percent of our energy, so the gain won’t be much even if we double or triple the output. To “clean coal technology”? More likely, cap and trade would just kill the coal industry.
So, what’s behind these anti-middle-class plans? The announced purpose is that the use of carbon-based fuels (oil, gas and coal) is increasing CO2, which is trapping heat in the atmosphere and causing the earth’s temperature to rise to catastrophic levels. A cap-and-trade system to curb CO2 emissions is supposed to be more politically attractive than a direct carbon tax.
But it’s not any cheaper. It’s just a different way of levying the tax.
A new report by the respected Tax Foundation found that cap and trade would impose an annual burden of $144.8 billion per year on U.S. households. Depending on how the process is structured, cap and trade could reduce household earnings by $37.8 billion, decrease U.S. employment by 965,000 jobs and reduce economic output by $136 billion per year, or roughly $1,145 per household.
Furthermore, cap and trade would be a regressive tax. The burden would be disproportionately borne by low-income households.
The Tax Foundation estimates that the bottom 20 percent of income earners would have an annual cap-and-trade burden equal to 6.2 percent of their household cash income, and the second quintile 3.2 percent.
Fortunately, the American people are waking up to the high cost of cap and trade. For the first time in Gallup’s 25-year history of asking about the trade-off between environmental protection and economic growth, a majority of Americans say the priority should be economic growth, “even if the environment suffers.”
The Copenhagen Climate Conference, which is scheduled to convene in December, is supposed to produce a replacement for the Kyoto agreement the U.S. Senate rejected. The globalists are already planning how to lock in the United States.
The Brookings Institution published a paper in January calling on President Obama to negotiate a “cap and trade” agreement with other countries and bypass the U.S. Constitution’s requirement that treaties need a two-thirds vote in our Senate to be ratified. This was corroborated by a Council on Foreign Relations report that complained: “The separation of powers enshrined in the U.S. Constitution, which gives Congress a critical voice in the ratification of treaties and endorsement of global institutions, complicates U.S. assumptions of new international obligations.”
Cap and tax would be a betrayal of Obama’s no-new-taxes promise, plus a blatant attempt by the globalists to override our U.S. Constitution by treaty. Americans must be on guard; our freedom depends on it.
Americans may soon become the innocent victims of highway robbery and home invasion. They will experience the humiliation, dismay, abasement, and financial loss associated with the misadventure. Many will realize afterward that they may have actually and unwittingly abetted one or more of the perpetrators. Locking cars and installing home security systems will not prevent the wrongdoing. No police agency will investigate the galling misdeed. The transgression will shockingly have the full protection of the legal system.
Our pop POTUS and Oval Office idol has proposed the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 and its “cap and trade” provisions. Everything these days in the White House seems to have security associated with it, except for national security. Mr. Obama, large in ego and short on talent, has found two Congressmen who will champion his proposal: US Senator Henry Waxman (D/CA) and House Representative Edward Markey (D/MA). Just imagine thousands of massive wind turbines offshore of Hyannis Port, Provincetown, Catalina, and Malibu. Picture thousands of solar panels in the deserts of the southern California and on the dunes of Cape Cod. Right! Keep dreaming. A more terrifying nightmare is about to become reality as Americans see their disposable income lessen as taxes and prices skyrocket should the American Clean Energy and Security Act becomes the law. Although the bill is noteworthy in its goal of a cleaner environment, it contains many provisions that will negatively affect Americans.
Obama, Biden, Waxman, Markey, and other proponents of the bill tout an 80% reduction in US greenhouse emissions. Al Gore, the universe’s foremost non-scientifically trained and educated expert on global warming, is another who supports The American Clean Energy bill. The former vice-president, presidential candidate, and professional environmental alarmist is a partner with the clean energy investment firm of Kleiner-Perkins. Both he and the firm will profit immensely should the bill become law. Few, however, make any mention that the emissions will actually increase for the next two decades. That undermines the laudable basic goal of the legislation. Cap and trade has intrinsic fallacies. The expanding statist federal government would set pollution levels for companies, but allow the same companies to offset the ceilings by purchasing carbon credits from others that are below standards. Larger American corporations are in a better position to actually profit from the trades while smaller companies will suffer. The prices Americans will pay for goods and services will increase.
All American industries just might find themselves in an economically disadvantageous position vis-à-vis foreign companies located in countries that have no limits and plan no future limits on gashouse emissions. China, India, and Russia are examples of nations that already pollute at higher levels than the USA. Their continued future pollution will more than compromise any reductions made in the USA. The European Union has a cap and trade system already operable. It is called the ETS, Emissions-Trading Scheme. At least the European socialists are honest enough to call it a scheme. The ETS is faltering as EU member nations scale-back the limits of allowable pollution as energy costs rise and jobs are lost. What? Job losses? Certainly! Multi-national corporations will save money on the hassles and costs of cap and trade by closing domestic facilities and moving them to countries lacking air and water standards. The US Chamber of Commerce estimates the number of American job losses at 1.9 million. Anticipate higher American unemployment figures as additional positions are eliminated or off-shored.
Food prices here will necessarily increase as more corn is used in the process of making ethanol. Other products will cost more to the consumer as our domestic industry tries to cope with increased costs of the energy and petroleum based products that they use. By the way, what happened to the noble idea of America exporting corn to feed the world’s starving people in underdeveloped countries? Those US Agency for International Development commercials are missed. American drivers who choose to purchase ethanol, or are forced to buy state mandated ethanol energy rather than gasoline, pay more for fuel due to the dramatic decrease in mileage. The production of ethanol is already subsidized by the government. The amount of energy consumed in the production of ethanol, $1.74 per gallon, is nearly double the cost of energy used in the production of gasoline, 95 cents per gallon. This wasted energy will rise as the federal government further adulterates the market economy and places additional fuel restrictions on vehicle manufacturers. Taxes on energy companies will increase by $30 billion. This will become another regressive tax burden on the average American as the taxes are passed to the consumers. This is another example of state-sponsored highway robbery. Hybrids and alternative fuelled cars and trucks are definitely a cleaner alternative to gasoline driven vehicles. However, consumers should conduct a thorough safety and cost analyses prior to purchasing. Americans will fall prey to home invaders as well. The costs to heat and to cool American homes will swell given the soaring prices for petroleum, natural gas, coal, and electricity increase and the additional taxes residents will pay on those heating and cooling products. Feel violated yet?
The Institute for Energy Research estimates a loss of $4022 to $6752 in disposable income per household due to the regressive American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009. Bloomberg.com quotes the Coalition for Affordable American Energy’s estimate of a more modest loss of $1,381 per household. The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office reports the measure would affect lower income households at a greater percentage of disposable income unless the energy price increases are offset by tax reductions or rebates. Can you say “regressive”? That opens the possibility of rebates or tax breaks for those with lower incomes while increasing the levels of taxation on those with higher incomes. The President and Congress could expand the definition of higher income to include more of the “middle class”. From each according to ability and to each according to need. For some reason some statists love that Marxist principle. Maybe they just like imposing their values upon others, or it maybe something else. The future of Americans will not get brighter or richer. It will include highway robbery and home invasion for all; and, the police will not even investigate.
“Americans have built a free enterprise, private-property, rule-of-law, respect-for-contracts, innovation-receptive society that has enabled us to enjoy the highest standard of living in the world.”
Of which, the libtards have almost totally destroyed.
This is nothing more than a ponzi scheme to rape the middle class.
Jay
Libtards … nothing more neo-marxist fascists. Nation of retards.
Governments create crises to sucker people into surrendering their freedoms and money.Global warming is but another non-crisis.The problem is we have The Manchurian President Obama who is riding roughshod over the constitution and he is yet to be put in his place.
Obama is trying everything he can think of to shut our country down! If he and his friends in the globalist, greenie cabal aren’t stopped, we’re doomed. They are, quite simply, “anti-energy.” We already have Oil, Coal and Natural gas in abundance, but they’ve all but shut down any future recovery or economical use of those assets. Windmills? The greenies won’t allow the “visual pollution”, harm to birds, or power lines needed to integrate any energy they produce (only when the wind is blowing) into the energy grid. Solar? The greenies won’t allow the solar panels anywhere there’s enough sunlight to make them economically feasible because they may inconvenience a few “creepy-crawlies” that exist in those areas. Nuclear? Can’t have any of that either because, the “greenies” are unable to differentiate nuclear POWER from Nuclear WEAPONS! Obama and the globalist greenies have already brought America to its knees. The ONLY hope is a second American Revolution! Bullets, not Ballots!
This is Obama’s economic vision. Higher prices as the cost of energy pushes up the cost of every good or service. Lower wages as manufacturing jobs continue to leave the country. A lower standard of living for all Americans.
Greenhouse gas: what a crock of BS. Has anyone here been inside of a greenhouse? Is it one of those places that makes you dizzy because of the higher CO2 content?
Has anyone seen CO2 canisters outside of a greenhouse, so as to benefit the growing of plants? OR, Is it a place that has more humidity (that’s water vapor, for any drones reading this)for plants to thrive in?
If you haven’t read “Green Hell” yet, I highly recommend it. “Going Green” should read as “Going Gangrene”; it’s so green it’s rotting. Stupid environmentalists. I stress MENTAL in environmentalists b/c that’s why they are; the problem is they have too much money, and too few brains cells.
If you (the greenies) prefer to live in the 18th century, then by all means go-ahead. But to hell w/you if you think you’re going to force me to live in those conditions. I like the 21st Century and the technology, thank you. Do you honestly believe that the likes of Robert Redford, Leonardo D’Caprio, Drew Barrymore, Al “Global Warming” Gore, Nancy Pelosi would gladly agree to roll back THEIR lifestyles to gain head nods from the greenies? I really didn’t want to become a political activiist, but after reading GH, I’m afraid I may not have a choice. (More of that ‘change’ you can believe in?) Here’s where I’m going to lose alot of the drones: it’s not about me, it’s about what country my children and grandchildren will have to live in.
Jay, Eric and Ol’ Irish, you all seem to have your heads on straight: I’m glad to be in good company.
Correction for previous post: “it’s about what country….” I meant to say, what kind of country will my children and grandchildren will have to live with/grow up in. USA? or USSA? BTW, any perceived CO2 reduction that the US contributes to ‘the world’ will be off-set courtesy of China. Hey Greenies! Did you know that China is building 2 coal-burning electic plants a month? Have you ever bothered to wonder why? Yeah! Why don’t you all go over there and try to pull your political/judicial cr@p over there?
Richard, Back at Ya! There are still a few of us out here that haven’t been brainwashed. As for GLOBAL Warming, I believe it has been going on cyclically for millions of years; long enough to melt off the glacial ice that formerly covered the entire northern half of the U.S. and long before any use of fossil fuel or the invention of the internal combustion engine. I don’t believe it represents ANY threat to us or the planet. The THREAT comes from what I like to call GOREBAL Warming, a complete hysterical fantasy being foisted on us for the sole purposes of crating a basis for “one world government” and the financial enrichment of its promoters.
Those who do not make their living from the land or live upon it in any meaningful way get further away from the truth of what a true environmentalist is.
We farmers & ranchers have been negligent in getting out our message. We need to be more aggressive in educating these city people about where their food & fiber comes from.
Cap & trade will further concentrate the agriculture industry, forcing those of us who are too small to comply with more EPA rules out of business.
Or, more ag land will be forced into development out of financial necessity.