Tailpipe Johnny's New Carbon Tax

Never in my wildest imagination did I ever think I'd be writing a blog post in praise of John "Tailpipe Johnny" Dingell, the aging mossback Democratic Representative of Detroit, Michigan.

But, in keeping with the ancient proverb of "confusion to our enemies," I am taking fiendish delight in seeing Tailpipe twist Frisco Nan's knickers into a knot over his inclusion of a carbon tax in the new House energy bill.

As a recent Wall Street Journal article (10 July) so well described, Tailpipe is forcing Nan to put her money where her mouth is. He knows that a carbon tax will raise gasoline prices and send voters screaming to the polls to oust the party responsible for it. But he also knows that Nan's approach, which is to just set high CAFE levels so she and her San Francisco hybrid liberal friends, can feel exonerated.

As the Journal piece notes,

"This week's prize for honest liberalism goes to Michigan's John Dingell, who is having fun with his fellow Democrats while also making a useful point about the politics of global warming. The venerable Chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee -- first elected in 1955 -- has announced that he plans to introduce as early as this week a new tax on carbon emissions.

Now, that's the way to clear a Capitol Hill hearing room. Americans are already miffed at paying $3 a gallon for gasoline, a fact that has the Members assailing oil companies on a daily basis. So the last thing Democrats seeking re-election want to do is pile on another dollar or two a gallon in taxes -- especially in the name of "saving the planet" from the speculative danger of global warming 50 or 100 years from now. Their voters have to deal with the more immediate danger of missing the mortgage payment.

Mr. Dingell knows all this. His point is to force his colleagues -- and the voters -- to be more honest about the cost of their global-warming posturing. It's one thing to pay 100 bucks to hear Madonna at the "Live Earth" concert, or impress your girlfriend by wearing an "I reduced my carbon footprint" T-shirt. It's quite another to accept that energy prices would have to rise by many multiples to make even a degree's worth of difference to the world's climate. "I sincerely doubt that the American people will be willing to pay what this is really going to cost them," Mr. Dingell said on C-SPAN last week."

In fact, the article notes that Europe has violated its Kyoto-accord carbon limits, and that 1970s-era CAFE regulations didn't stop US gasoline demand from rising, either. Later in the piece, the Journal notes,

"Regarding such a tax, Democrats already have some hard political experience. In 1993, Vice President Al Gore convinced Bill Clinton to propose an energy tax on BTU (British thermal units) usage. That would have added about 12 cents a gallon to the price of gas. House Democrats walked the plank and passed it, only to have Senate Democrats kill it. As much as anything else, that vote cost Democrats control of the House in 1994. Now Mr. Gore has embraced the carbon tax once again -- though we still haven't heard him endorse a direct tax on gas or consumers."

You really have to love our Founding Fathers for constructing a political system so complex that even someone like Tailpipe Johnny eventually finds it worthwhile to take on his own party's House Speaker, in defense of his voters. Despite my dislike for Tailpipe, I truly respect him for forcing the Left Coast liberal hypocrites to now step up and vote their conscience on this faux-issue, while possibly losing their seats...nevermind their asses....in the bargain.

Yet another reason why I believe the 'human-sourced global warming' position is unproven, and dangerous to believe otherwise, for economic reasons. Tailpipe obviously agrees. He also clearly feels the current Speaker has not 'led' sufficiently well on this, or other issues, and is using his committee chairmanship to register his disappointment in Frisco Nan's "leadership."