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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Katelew who wrote (71035)	6/7/2008 7:16:54 AM
From: Lane3	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 542169

I don't recall him discussing cap and trade which is totally unrelated to the high and rising price of oil. His suggestion was to take the current prices of gasoline even higher by slapping some additional taxes on it to the point at which consumers would voluntarily conserve. Indeed. So why do you think he was advocating that? Because he thinks that voluntary conservation is preferable to cap and trade and hiking the cafe standards, the latter of which he did explicitly mention. His argument is that, if we are going to do something to force conservation, let's take the tax route. He's focused on gasoline prices as the casualty of higher oil prices. I submit that you're the one focused on high oil and gas prices, not him, so you're reading that into his article. It's your hobby horse, not his. He's focused on conservation and the most rational way to achieve it, if we want to achieve it. He doesn't even advocate achieving it. He's reacting to objectionable, to him, conservation proposals currently on the table, proposals such as cafe standards and cap and trade. This is the thrust of his article. "You want more fuel-efficient cars? Don't regulate. Don't mandate. Don't scold. Don't appeal to the better angels of our nature. Do one thing: Hike the cost of gas until you find the price point." His point is not about gas prices but about conservation. The conservation initiatives on the table are a function of GW, not oil and gas prices. He threw in one sloppy and gratuitous sentence about Saudis and gas prices and it hit your hot button, which side-tracked you from the point he was trying to make. Gas pricing wasn't anywhere close to the gist of his article. That's your issue, not his. People like Mr. K shouldn't even comment on matters of the economy when they're so lacking in understanding. You simply got sidetracked and missed his point.