Gassed
I last wrote about the idea of holding a special session to debate lowering the recent 2.8-cent jump in the gas tax here and here.
Others weigh in here, here, here and here.
My latest reading of the landscape here is that North Carolinians should (Eds note: 8p.m., I thought that I had fixed this ages ago but apparently it didn't take. So I'm fixing it again.) not expect to see the honorables trucking back to town any time soon. If for no other reason, there aren’t enough Democrats in the Senate willing to put their name to a call for a special session.
Plus, the latest 25-cent jump at the gas pump seems to have drowned out the tax increase. I guess it’s trendy to be mad at the oil companies over fuel prices again rather than the government.
That's not to say there isn't some entertainment to be had out of this affair.
After the first meeting of the committee appointed to examine gas prices (read: the committee appointed so legislators can say they actually did something in response to all the hue and cry over this issue), House Speaker Jim Black and Senate leader Marc Basnight sent a letter to the state's Washington representatives. Click here to read the whole thing, but it said in part:
As you know, this problem is certainly not unique to our state; on average the nation's gasoline prices have risen by more than 25 percent compared to just one year ago, and home heating costs have risen as well. And as these prices have soared - hurting families, businesses and senior citizens - our nation's major oil companies have enjoyed record-high profits. For example, Exxon's third-quarter 2005 net income was up 75 percent compared to just one year earlier - the biggest quarterly profit of any company in history - while during this same time period consumers were paying at the pump more than $3 for one gallon of gasoline.
It was a very nice letter, very polite I thought. But U.S. Rep. Sue Myrick took it badly. (Myrick is a Republican and frequently mentioned as someone who might be running for governor in 2008. Yes, even though that election is two years off, the jockeying for position has already begun.) Myrick wrote back(read the whole letter here - it's a PDF) saying it was the Democratic leaders’ mismanagement of the highway money that was the problem, not the fact that oil companies keep raising prices for gas.
The first step in recovery is to acknowledge you have a problem. Your actions are the problem. I reject your efforts to deflect this problem to the federal government; thus trying to further tax the people.
Ouch. Someone is off someone else’s Christmas card list.
So Julie Robinson, Black's spokeswoman, circulated (an e-mail responding to Myrick. It quoted Black as saying:
"I was quite surprised by Sue Myrick's negative response to our request for congressional help to bring down gas prices since we've been able to work together in the past," Speaker Black said, "but apparently she was having a bad day when she wrote this letter. I think all North Carolinians do well when we all work together in a cooperative, bipartisan way, which I hope she'll be able to do in the future for the sake of all of our people."
The bottom line? Come election time, you can expect Republicans and Democrats to still be bickering about this issue but more than likely nothing will have been done to, you know, fix the problem.
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