The plight of the hybrid owner and gas taxes

There's some debate going on here in the San Jose Mercury News regarding the special carpool lane accessibility to certain hybrid owners. In a nutshell, the geniuses in the California government decided to grant 75,000 passes to hybrid owners that permit them to drive in the carpool lane with only one driver. Hmmm, weren't we told that the original reason for carpool lanes was to take cars off the roads by putting people with similar origination and desinations into one vehicle? Anyway, the original program was supposed to run for a fixed period of time and now that the end of the program is approaching, the people with the special access are getting concerned that they may lose their privilege. Boo f*$king hoo. I have absolutely no problem with the hybrid vehicles or the people that buy them -- I love the fact that this technology is starting to enter the market and may be a step in the direction of imrpoving our environment and lessening our dependence on fossil fuels. But, I riddle you this -- why does one group get the ability to spend extra money to get a special privilege? Hey, wait a sec, what's the difference between that and letting the so-called "rich" buy their way into toll lanes? Hmmm... Sounds like standard liberal "siutational ethics" to me.

On top of this benefit, California and (I beleive) the federal goverment give tax credits (not deductions) to purchasers of hybrid vehicles. Now, if the goal is to lower tailpipe emissions, wouldn't it be better use of our tax dollars to give that $3000 subsidy to a person with an out-of-tune '88 Chevy Lumina and encourage them to buy a new, fuel-efficient, low-emmission vehicle? I would suspect that many Prius owners are looking more at cars such as the Corolla, Civic, etc. and the incremental gain in fuel-efficiency and reduction of pollution is nil. But, what the hell do I know. My two cars get a collective average of 14 mpg, but they both do 0-60 in less than 6 seconds and one can cruise all day SAFELY at 130 mph.

To take it one step further, here in California, our registration fees are calculated as a percentage of the MSRP (new cars) or sale price (used cars) of the vehicle, and depreciate on a scale each subsequent year. In 2000, I was fortunate enough to purchase my dream car -- cash. I wrote a check to the dealer for a cool $70,000 and drove away in the car I wanted since I was a child, asked my father what it was and he replied "Son, that's a Porsche 911". HOWEVER, that transaction also set me back over $900 in taxes for the privilege of driving it on our miserable roads. After a few days, I thought about that and mused that wouldn't it make more sense to tie the registration fees to something consumption-based such as the weight of the vehicle or it's EPA mileage rating? Why does the guy in the $25,000 full-size pickup that takes up more space on the road, gets worse mileage, spews out more pollution and does more damage to the road, pay one-third that I pay? During a moment of clarity, I realized that the tax is there because "If you can afford a Porsche, you can afford to pay your fair share". Once that sunk in, I snapped off a 6th to 3rd shift at 75mph and zipped around the Ford Explorer slowing my approach to the exit, whipped around him and tore down the offramp all the while thinking to myself, "Yes, I do own the goddamn road, now get out of my way". While Tom Cruise is a tool, he did utter a great line in "Risky Business" -- "Porsche. There is no substitute."

Finally, to end my rant tonight on hybrids and the price of gasoline, there was recently a bill introduced by California Assemblyman Johan Klehs who thought it would be a good idea to impose a 2% tax on oil company profits above some arbitrary amount and use the money (get this!) to help low- and moderate-income senior citizens pay for prescription medicine. What in the hell?? If we're going to do something colossally stupid as impose this tax, why would that money go to funding meds?!?! I mean, yes, we probably need to provide more assistance to seniors, but how are these two related?!?! Assemblyman Klehs, if you want to get me to support your gas tax, put the money back into roads. The moron. To further why we don't need this tax, Mark Clayton of the Christian Science Monitor has an excellent real-world example of what happened in 1980 with the Crude Oil Windfall tax. Scroll to the bottom of this article and take a look at the graph.

Dick Durbin almost had it right but still, if we as a population don't like $3/gallon and beyond, don't buy the damn gas!! Have your kids walk to school. Take a bus to your job. Buy a car with better mileage. The solutions are out there already. Adding more taxes and disincenting business is not the answer.