The price isn't right
People like the idea of a carbon tax, they just don't want to pay it
By LORRIE GOLDSTEIN
http://www.edmontonsun.com/Comment/2008/05/14/5559511-sun.html
Here in the department of the painfully obvious we're pleased to
announce that polls suggest people are strongly in favour of paying
carbon taxes, until they actually have to pay them.
Then ... not so much.
To illustrate, a recent Canadian Press Harris/Decima poll found
Canadians surveyed sup****ted "a carbon tax levied on people and
businesses based on the carbon emissions they generate" by a margin of
61% to 32%.
Except in B.C., where on July 1 people will be hit with a real carbon
tax imposed by their provincial government. There, sup****t for a
carbon tax which hasn't even gone into effect yet, plunges to 49% in
favour, 41% opposed.
Meanwhile, in Great Britain, where people already pay carbon taxes, a
recent Opinium Research poll found almost three in four (72%) oppose
paying higher taxes to fight climate change and two in three (67%)
believe the government's entire "green" agenda is just a ploy to raise
taxes.
Meanwhile, The Canadian Press re****ts Liberal pollster Michael
Marzolini has warned Liberal Leader Stephane Dion that his plan to
campaign for a carbon tax in the next federal election would be
politically risky and a tough sell to Canadian voters.
Marzolini has declined comment, but if he did warn Dion, he's a smart
guy.
HELLO, GM WORKERS
Personally, I'm guessing a carbon tax won't go down particularly well
in, oh, say, Windsor, where GM just announced another 1,400 layoffs in
Ontario's struggling automotive sector. But maybe that's just me.
Should Dion decide to campaign on bringing in a carbon tax, here are
seven quick questions to ask him and/or your local Liberal candidate:
(1) Explain how a carbon tax will reduce Canada's greenhouse gas (GHG)
emissions. Be specific.
(2) Stephane Dion, back when he opposed a carbon tax, said Canada will
make "megatonnes of money" by cutting "megatonnes of emissions."
Explain how, exactly.
(3) Stephane Dion says a carbon tax will be "revenue neutral." Revenue
neutral for whom? For me? If so, will you publicly guarantee me here
and now that if I vote Liberal, I will pay no more in total federal
taxes than I do today, following the imposition of your "revenue
neutral" carbon tax?
(4) How much of this tax will be spent reducing Canada's own GHG
emissions and by how much, as opposed to sending money to developing
countries such as China and India in hopes of reducing their
emissions?
(5) Will you use funds from this tax to buy hot air credits from
Russia, which has plenty to sell under the Kyoto accord, given that
its economy collapsed following the break-up of the Soviet Union in
1991, while Kyoto's base year just happens to be 1990 -- meaning
Russia lowered its emissions by suffering a massive recession?
(6) If the answer to (5) is yes, what good does it do Canada to buy
hot air from Russia?
(7) Stephane Dion says a carbon tax is a good idea because it will
increase taxes on things we want to discourage, such as emitting
carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, while reducing taxes on things we
want to encourage, such as income and profit. But if it's such a good
idea, why didn't the Liberals apply it to reducing air pollution, let
alone greenhouse gases, during the 12 years they formed the government
from 1993 to early 2006?
--
If you disagree with the theories and dogmas of Marxism or Scientific
Socialism
then you are a tool of Capitalist interests. If you disagree with the
theories
or dogmas of Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming then you are a tool
of
Capitalistic interests. Notice a pattern here? -- Captain Compassion
The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority but to
escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane. -- Marcus Aurelius
"...the whole world, including the United States, including all that
we have known and cared for, will sink into the abyss of a new Dark
Age, made more sinister, and perhaps more protracted, by the lights
of perverted science." -- Sir Winston Churchill
Joseph R. Darancette
daranc@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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