Shut up Bitch! Part III

Here's more on the fake GOP antics--from Thomas Friedman:

I've always thought Dick Cheney took national security seriously. I don't anymore. It seems that Mr. Cheney is so convinced that we have no choice but to be dependent on crude oil, so convinced that conservation is just some silly liberal hobby, that he will never seriously summon the country to kick its oil habit, never summon it to do anything great. Listen to Mr. Cheney's answer when the conservative talk show host Laura Ingraham asked him how he reacted to my urgings for a gasoline tax to push all Americans to drive energy-saving vehicles and make us energy-independent -- now.
''Well, I don't agree with that,'' Mr. Cheney said. ''I think -- the president and I believe very deeply that, obviously, the government has got a role to play here in terms of supporting research into new technologies and encouraging the development of new methods of generating energy. But we also are big believers in the market, and that we need to be careful about having government come in, for example, and tell people how to live their lives. This notion that we have to 'impose pain,' some kind of government mandate, I think we would resist. The marketplace does work out there.'' Also, why does Mr. Cheney have no problem influencing the market by lowering taxes to get consumers to spend, but he rejects raising gasoline taxes to get consumers to save energy -- a fundamental national interest. Finally, if Mr. Cheney believes so much in markets, why did the 2005 energy act contain about $2 billion in tax breaks for oil companies? Why does his administration permit a 54-cents-a-gallon tax on imported ethanol -- fuel made from sugar or corn -- so Brazilian sugar exports won't compete with American sugar? Yes, we tax imported ethanol from Brazil, but we don't tax imported oil from Saudi Arabia, Venezuela or Russia. Mr. Cheney, we are told, is a ''tough guy.'' Really? Well, how tough is this: We have a small gasoline tax, but Europe and Japan tax their gasoline by $2 and $3 a gallon, or more. They use those taxes to build schools, highways and national health care for their citizens. But they spend very little on defense compared with us.
So who protects their oil supplies from the Middle East? U.S. taxpayers. We spend nearly $600 billion a year on defense, a large chunk in the Persian Gulf. But how do we pay for that without a gas tax? Income taxes and Social Security. Yes, we tax our incomes and raid our children's Social Security fund so Europeans and Japanese can comfortably import their oil from the gulf, impose big gas taxes on it at their pumps and then use that income for their own domestic needs. And because they have high gas taxes, they also beat Detroit at making more fuel-efficient cars. Now how tough is that?

It is just disgusting where people love oil and its record profits. At the same time, people in lower and middle classes are suffering. It is just disgusting. And you wonder why the Middle East is in such disarray. If Iran disrupts oil, then people will have to take public transportation much sooner. If you take a look at the European nations, people take transit all the time. Why? Gas is so damn high. But they get used to it. They do not complain. The U.S. will have to face the aspects of many more people taking public transit--rail or bus-- if oil price rise so sharply. And if that happens, then the American people are going to look at themselves and say to themselves f**k the oil companies. People are going to find alternatives, particularly in the blue states. They know that having alternative sources of energy and mass transit is going to have long term benefits rather than being hostage to oil all the time. They have better recognize this--or else. And you wonder why people say that this country is so f**ked up! (Polls show that the overwhelmingly majority say that this country is headed toward the wrong direction.) You choose. Thomas Friedman says it perfectly!