This headline made my head spin.
President Joe Biden and Democratic lawmakers are weighing a federal gas tax holiday as prices reach record levels and the party faces an uphill battle in November’s midterm election.
Two of the Democrats most vulnerable senators up in 2022 – Mark Kelly of Arizona and Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire – have proposed a bill that would suspend the federal gas tax until Jan. 1, 2023.
‘Every tool is on the table to reduce prices,’ White House spokeswoman Emilie Simons said in a statement to DailyMail.com. ‘The President already announced an historic release of 50 million barrels from the strategic petroleum reserve, and all options are on the table looking ahead.’
The federal gas tax is 18.4 cents per gallon for standard gasoline and 24.4 cents per gallon for diesel fuel.
Today’s gas average is $3.498 a gallon, according to AAA. California, which has the highest price of any state, is approaching the $5 mark as its average price hits $4.711.
The overall average price of gas is up $1 over the past year.
Has prices have shot up nearly 60% since Biden was sworn in.
The two primary causes are inflation and Biden’s crushing of the oil industry with reduced leasing on public land and limiting pipeline construction (the KXL being the most controversial but not the only one).
The Democrats poll numbers are so low the Democrats are probably on suicide watch.
But an 18-cent tax break on a 60% increase doesn’t help.
But the Democrats have their balls in a vice by the radical environmentalists and Cult of Climate Change that they can’t actually do what needs to be done and open up the oil industry to make America self sufficient on oil again.
They are stuck between a rock (bottom barrel poll numbers) and a hard place (their radical base) and are floundering incompetently.
My biggest fear is that Republicans will snatch defeat from the jaws of victory by bumble-fucking their response.
Nice optics there — a tax cut that expires right after the elections.
And after the elections, the gas tax will be raised to “recover” the “lost” revenue.
An 18 cent reduction will bring gas prices here to where they were about a month ago, which is still crippling. Fuck Joe Biden and the rest of the putrid Commie dogs in his administration.
You misspelled “bitches”.
Recently IL tied its gas tax to inflation. That’s going to hit 7/1. Chicago/Cook County tied its property tax to inflation. They are crapping themselves now
Massachusetts tried that with gas tax…fortunately, the voters broomed it.
Its another ploy to show how short most peoples memory is….
The Federal Highways Administration is funded by that tax. Conventional road improvements (outside of the spendulus bills) come from that tax. Literally billions of dollars of grant funding to State and local DOTs is going to evaporate because of this.
But… wait, didn’t they just pass an infrastructure bill? Yes, they did, and none of the projects funded under those bills are going to replace the ones delayed or deleted because of this ‘tax cut”
Typical children. Taking action without considering the adverse impacts.
Then again, money is fungible. The claim that the FHA is “funded by gas taxes” always was a political fiction, every bit as nonexistent as the “social security trust fund”.
Two thoughts:
1. Oregon will likely see this as an opportunity to increase the state gas tax by the same amount as the federal tax that goes away. And when the federal tax holiday ends after mid-terms, the state will not reduce it again. That’s how they roll; taxes are a ratcheting system, always tighter, never loosened.
2. I don’t mean to sound pessimistic, but if anyone can snatch defeat from the jaws of even this stupidly-easy victory, it’s the GOP. Most are so eager to be Dem-Lite, they wouldn’t recognize small-government conservatism or free-market capitalism if it bit them on the @$$ and introduced itself.
We all know the way to really lower gas prices AND keep collecting that 18 Cents.
Allow Fracking on Federal Lands, Build the Keystone Pipeline, Build the new Enbridge Line 5 Pipeline, Build the Dakota Access Pipeline, Encourage the pipeline across the Mediterranean from the Israeli gas fields to Europe. And convince the idiots in NY to allow fracking too.
No, let the idiots in new york freeze in the dark.
Shorter recommendation.
.
Undo Every Freaking Policy that F. Joe Biden changed the first week in the White House.
Not only would that fix the US Energy Policy and lower gas prices, but we could fix the Border and Immigration Problems, and lower insulin prices. Unfortunately that will not fix the Afghanistan Debacle, or bring the 13 dead back.
.
So much has gone to shit in 12 short months.
$3.47/gal for gas and $3.34/gal for heating oil is what I paid yesterday on 02/16/2022. Not the most I’ve ever paid for gas, but the most Ive ever paid for heating oil. I think maybe I paid more in 2008/2009 when I paid the oil bill for my parents because my dad was out of work.
I saw diesel for $4.01/gallon a couple days ago. My company is burning $16,000/week in fuel.