The Real Global Warming Swindle

It's always been about the redistribution of wealth. The science was almost besides the point. It was seen as yet another way to take money from wealthy countries and distribute it among the less wealthy on a macro level. On a national level, it is now being seen as a way to take more taxpayer dollars and transfer them to the government in the form of new taxes.

The science is far from settled on the matter, and yet the politicians are racing to find new ways to put the science to use - raising taxes in pursuit of the goal of saving the planet from ourselves.

Dealing with global warming will be painful, says one of the most powerful Democrats in Congress. To back up his claim he is proposing a recipe many people won't like _ a 50-cent gasoline tax, a carbon tax and scaling back tax breaks for some home owners.

"I'm trying to have everybody understand that this is going to cost and that it's going to have a measure of pain that you're not going to like," Rep. John Dingell, who is marking his 52nd year in Congress, said Wednesday in an interview with The Associated Press.

Dingell will offer a "discussion draft" outlining his tax proposals on Thursday, the same day that President Bush holds a two-day conference to discuss voluntary efforts to combat climate change.

But Dingell, chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee that will craft climate legislation, is making it clear that he believes tackling global warming will require a lot more if it is to be taken seriously.

He wants to raise the gas tax by 50 cents per gallon. For all Democrats demogoguery over high gas prices, Dingell wants to inflict further pain in the form of an onerous hike of 50 cents per gallon. That would most certainly put a crimp in the economic growth of the country, force millions of people to reconsider how they get to work every day, and force many to consider how to pay for basic foodstuffs as the price to bring those items to the store is increased to cover the increased transportation costs.

Of course, Dingell and others who propose such taxes will claim that it's all for the public good and that the money will go somewhere, but that's not mentioned. As for his other suggested tax hikes, they are:

_A 50-cent-a-gallon tax on gasoline and jet fuel, phased in over five years, on top of existing taxes.

_A tax on carbon, at $50 a ton, released from burning coal, petroleum or natural gas.

_Phaseout of the interest tax deduction on home mortgages for homes over 3,000 square feet. Owners would keep most of the deduction for homes at the lower end of the scale, but it would be eliminated entirely for homes of 4,200 feet or more.

So, if Dingell gets all that he proposes (and one has to wonder where John Edwards or Al Gore stands on the McMansion rule given the size and prodigious use of power to run those homes), we'd have higher gas taxes, homeowners of McMansions would pay far more, and everyone would pay higher utility bills because the utilities will pass along the tax hike to the ultimate user - you.

The government influencing public conduct through tax policy is a very poor method of securing an outcome, and not only distorts the marketplace, but adds to an already cumbersome tax code.

Also, there's absolutely no indiciation that any of these will actually reduce the level of so-called greenhouse gases emitted around the world one iota - not when you have places like China and India growing at prodigious rates and whose industries spew out more emissions than the US now does (see China in particular).