Christina’s Common Sense

How would you feel about paying $0.50 more a gallon for gas?

If you greet that concept with mixed feelings—dread and angst—you’re hardly alone. But if you live in my adopted home state of Michigan, it could become a sad reality.

Michigan is already in an economic jam, and now Con. John Dingell wants to make it worse by raising gas taxes $0.50 a gallon. Last time I gassed up, I paid $3.45 a gallon. A $0.50 tax would mean almost $4 a gallon! Ouch!

But there’s more to this story than a hit in the wallet. Dingell’s rationale is that this tax will encourage people to consume less fuel and therefore be more environmentally friendly.

What do you call using money to change someone’s behavior? Extortion, that’s what you call it. It’s kind of illegal. But then, so’s theft, which is what the government does when it takes your money and gives it to someone who hasn’t earned it. But I guess the law only applies to those of us who don’t hold elected office.