CNN reports:
Every American taxpayer would get a $100 rebate check to offset the pain of higher pump prices for gasoline, under an amendment Senate Republicans hope to bring to a vote Thursday.
While they're at it why don't they just vote themselves free campaign ads? As the K Street Gang's popularity sags to perilously low levels, a transparent attempt at vote buying is the best the Senate GOP can come up with?
In the first place, this sort of pandering really is unnecessary. Yes, people are annoyed by gas prices, but as Nick Schulz points out, their annoyance isn't changing behavior - and for good reason:
Energy prices may be rising, but energy itself is much less important to consumers and to the overall economy than it once was.
According to the Bureau of Economic Affairs ( see chart here), American consumer spending on energy as a fraction of total personal consumption has declined considerably since 1980. Whereas 25 years ago, one in every ten consumer dollars was spent on energy, today it's one in every 16. In other words, what it takes to heat and cool our homes and drive to and from our jobs and vacation destinations is relatively less costly than it was then. ...
Of course, no one likes to pay more at the pump. And with some analysts predicting oil per barrel going up to $75 or higher in the near future, we might see retail prices go up further still. But unlike a generation or two ago, these increases won't prompt the broader economic pain they once did.
In the second, whatever happened to being the party of limited government and economic sense? Instead, as John Hinderaker reports:
The Republican Senators' proposal does nothing, other than ANWR drilling, that acknowledges the rules of supply and demand that govern prices. The "Gas Price Relief and Rebate Act" is mostly crude pandering of the kind we used to expect from Democrats, not Republicans.
One is tempted to agree with Bill Quick's summation:
We have to wake up the Stupid Party, before it completely merges itself into the Republicrat Statist Party.
