"Green" vehicles hurt government revenue.

Fair enough--I'll concede this much.

This is related to oil warz/DoD/Halliburton how? Even if we evacuated every soldier from the Middle East tomorrow and apologized to the terrorists, tails between our legs, they wouldn't stop trying to kill us. I don't know why you believe Bin Laden/Al-Qaeda, etc. when they say they attack us because of our oil wars. They attack us because they hate us and will stop at nothing to destroy us, and they would simply find another excuse if they didn't have "oil warzzz". They use that line because a sizable portion of the US public - including you - believe it, too. And it has more traction because of that.

Guaranteeing the Israeli people the right to exist in the face of such hatred by Hamas/Hezbollah/etc. is a bad thing?

I admit that Egypt is a more questionable call - I believe that throwing Hosni Mubarak under the bus was Obama's greatest foreign policy blunder to date - but we can carry that on elsewhere in a new thread if you like.

You don't want to cut the Energy Department. Trust me, they're the same guys that mandated everyone use mercury-bulbs, which is something that will help "reduce reliance on oil and $1T a year in warz".

Go ahead and cut the pensions and services of people who willing to lay it all down on the line to save your butt. You might not agree with all the places in the world they've been deployed too - I sure as hell don't - but I cut them some respect regardless. And $70 billion is a tiny fraction of what we spend on SNAP, WIC, TANF, LIHEAP, SSI, PPACA, and all the other acronese programs the Federal government likes to cook up.

I agree there's some cuts needed here - TSA for starters. But there's others, such as Border Patrol, that need to be ramped up.

If it weren't for NASA, no space program, no man on the moon, and more importantly, as you mention, no satellites. That means no satellite phones, no satellite TV, and no GPS for your Navi-equipped Prius.

Oh, and no Google Earth, either. Because Google Earth got all its information from Keyhole military satellites when it got started.

Undoubtedly, we overspend on our military budget, and the DoD way overspends on materials that could be found far more cheaply in the private sector. Admittedly, saying that a toilet seat cost $30,000 isn't much of an exaggeration - and would could do well with some serious accountability and streamlining.

I think I've touched on it all.



Mods--can we split the defense spending discussion into its own thread, and put all involved parties in the Politics forum subgroup? Thanks.

 

You mean terrorists like Bin Laden, the US trained and supported ally of US whose terrorism vs.Afghans, Russians and Indians we applauded and financed when it served our purposes trying to tear down Russia's puppet government in Afghanistan but who we didn't like so much when he attacked US for our puppet government in Saudi.

Or Saddam, who was our best friend for life when attacked Iran but we didn't like so much when he attacked Kuwait?

Those terrorists born of US strategy to secure Middle East oil fields?

Why do you want to cut military pensions? By how much do you want to cut military pensions. You are the first person who I've heard advocate cutting military pensions.

All US military operations in Middle East are related to oil. It is the strategic driver, the No. 1 threat to US national security per Pentagon planning for the last 30 years. Oil is why US has been at war in the Middle East for the last 20 years, spending $1T per year, first supporting Saddam and Bin Laden and then fighting Saddam and Bin Laden. It's all about oil.

Which is brings us back to the topic of why green vehicles that use less gasoline or no gasoline need to be promoted not taxed. The $1.4T a year in military costs, the $500B a year in oil trade deficit taxes, the destruction of entire seas with oil well blowouts, climate change. Those green vehicles fix the problem of US energy inefficiency, 50% less than Europe which has achieved a 50% better energy efficiency than US by taxing gasoline use to discourage use and to pay for increasing energy efficiency overall.

So green vehicles do not hurt government revenue. They lower government costs and should be promoted.

 

The analysis ignores the fact that gasoline prices have been continually increasing, which has thereby increased tax revenue.

Overall, the analysis is false: By and large, people don't buy efficient vehicles out of altruism, they do it to save money. The gasoline co's and the governments cannot assume that gas prices and consumption will increase indefinitely, nor that fuel efficiency is the only solution consumers will choose. When fuel prices spike, consumers reduce their fuel consumption via all means -- carpooling, telecommuting, reducing unnecessary travel, using mass transit and otherwise adjusting their lives. So this notion that fuel efficient vehicles cost the government money is fundamentally false: That money was never there to begin with, because there's a limit to how much consumers are willing to pay for gasoline.

 

In my state, Gas tax is entirely per gallon, not per dollar, this will change some of your assumptions.
In CA there is a 35 cent per gallon tax and a 2.25% sales tax that is per dollar.

I have not seen any reason to worry that taxes based on the increased price of a hybrid, (sales Tax, license tabs, VAT) are in fact offset by taxes based on reduced consumption by a hybrid. (gas taxes)

 

Did I miss a nuclear war or something? I live on the Gulf and it was not destroyed as of 1600 EST today.

And if you think the BP spill was bad, that's because your totally ignoring all the pollution causing the much, much larger dead zone.

 

Guess you missed the big oil spill that destroyed the Gulf of Mexico ecosystem.





It wasn't just the 220,000,000 gallons of toxic crude oil, it was the 2,000,000 gallons of toxic COREXIT 9500 (dontcha love the name?).

I'm not sure I agree with you a hundred percent on your police work, there, Lou. That Gulf of Mexico was already destroyed in many sections would make the BP spill even worse, not minimize it. The difference between a healthy person getting pneumonia and weak and sickly person getting pneumonia, for them it is fatal.

 

It would be nice to have responsible discussion. Unfortunately, extreme hyperbole derails that. Just yesterday I had Gulf Grouper for lunch. That would not be possible if the entire Gulf of Mexico were totally "destroyed".

I can just hope you eventually realize you can get more mileage out of a reasonably presented viewpoint. Whereas steamrolling potential supporters with the most extreme viewpoint language possible.....well it is just not possible to have supporters.

Would really like to talk about the different approaches to improving the world's oceans, but that's hard to do if the oceans are completely destroyed and past the point of no return. Why bother to talk?

 

See above scientific data. Somebody's going to eat the last fish, catch the last shrimp. Are the dead zones in the Gulf growing or shrinking?

The BP Gulf disaster, similar to Exxon Gulf of Alaska disaster which destroyed a large piece of AK ecology, will happen again. BP et al got the go ahead to start destroying the US East coast right before the Gulf disaster. They still have permission.

Garcon! More shrimp with my COREXIT 9500!

Or is that less shrimp?



Now if we had $10 gallon tax on gasoline like European nations, we would be much more efficient and not need these extremely unreliable deep water oil wells.

 

But according to your words, we are already there. Can't grow any larger than the entire gulf.

 

Well I decided not to take any chances so I said screw the green, and I went with blizzard pearl.

 

Dead man walking.

 

First off ... it's VERY unlikely we will ever stop supporting mid east / oil links (support of governments there that keep the oil flowing). Second ... what do you base the belief on, that 'they' would still want to kill us? Do we want to still kill the British, after they stopped messing with north america in the 1700's? No? Well there you go. Btw ... the british used to call US the terrorists, when we went against them. See how easy it is to brand groups with labels that support (wrong) ideas? Remember in the black and white movie days - we call native americans, "blood thirsty savages" ? That fits into the same agenda. We slaughter native americans, they defend their rights ... and we call them blood thirsty. Sorry ... I gota laugh . . . .

.

 

As long as US needs the oil, Middle East oil cutoff will be the No. 1 military threat for which US spends money. As Gen. Colin Powell recently noted, US faces no real threats other than Middle East oil cutoff.

US spending $1.4T EVERY YEAR for military in a hopeless effort to "secure" the Middle oil supplies for US vs. US spending $1T ONCE to get US to European levels of energy efficiency, 50% more efficient as US and eliminating need for oil imports, eliminating No. 1 military threat to US, eliminating need for 50% of US military spending.

 

Hill, I've got to agree with the poster, who is saying even if the US acted perfectly according to the terrorists starting now, the FBI would still need counter terrorism.

First terror is a tactic, its not a group of people. It is the act of killing non-combatants on purpose, not as collateral damage. The Americans government has been fighting this since the revolution. It was the british not the american's that used acts of terrrorism in the birth of this nation. They paid and armed native Americans to go into villiages and slaugter the innocents. Carter took this tactic one step further and paid and armed foreign fighters to attack Afghanistan, and Regan continued the policy. Its these groups along with those funded and armed by SA, Iraq, Iran, and Syria that will continue to use terrorism against the United States for a long time The US also has domestic terrorsts as you may note from the oklahoma city bombing. No matter what the US policy is in the mideast, the FBI will have to fight terrorism.

This does not mean that those that blew up the African embassies, and flew airplanes into the twin towers and pentagon were not terrorists. Spending money at the FBI to stop them is not a cost of oil.

 

The American government was the "terrorist" during the US revolution according to the British. Current Israeli government were the "terrorists" in their war against the British. People fighting foreign occupation by military powers are typically called "terrorists" by the occupying military power.

US has been in constant state of war vs. Middle East for the last 20 years, occupying significant portions of the area. Prior to that and to this day we are big supporters of military dictatorships in the Middle East as long as they agree to sell us their oil. We over throw democratically elected government in Iran and then complain about them tossing out the military dictatorship we imposed on them for decades, a dictatorship accused of...terrorism...vs the people of Iran.

All for oil we wouldn't need if spent one year's military budget ($1.4T) making US as energy efficient as Europe and eliminating need for oil imports. US would lose all interest in Middle East.

The oil based terrorists in Middle East (who US supported for years when their terrorism was directed at Russia and India) would lose all interest in US.

 

That's true . . . ah la the Oklahoma boming / Timothy McVeigh. Yea - not all the angry people with an ax to grind against U.S. goings on come from abroad. I can't imagine how much better our nations' counter terrorism would be though, if even 20% of the military budget were allocated to couner terrorism. Heck . . . even the fuel budget would significantly improve it.

Same could be said for Green vehicle R & D. But unfortunately, green vehicle R & D has much less of a lobby (comparred to the industrial military manufacturing complex) going before congress. So ... we're stuck making laser guided bombs ... instead of funding more towards better batteries or capacitor R & D.
.

 

Green Vehicles don't need a lobby to succeed, they need an educated public. The rest solves itself.

For example, LED lightbulbs are seen as being crazy expensive.....to the uneducated. When I first saw the strange orange LED bulbs at Home Depot and the price, the shelves were untouched for weeks. But now that the understanding is spreading, I often find vastly more empty spots.

Finally, the EV and PHV void is disappearing. Over the next ten years, production, not niche, battery powered vehicles will be on the road in force.

 

If people drive less, they will spend less on petrol, hence the gov't gets less petrol tax money.

However, what will the people do with the money they save? Spend it? If they spend it, the gov't gets tax revenue from that expenditure.

 

That spent money does not necessarily go to the state though. This is the state of oregon, trying to get specific taxes. The easiest thing to do is raise the fuel tax, but that is not as popular.