It’s August and Congress is in Session?
Well, at least the Republicans are. Normally August is considered a “District Work Period” or recess on the Hill. But some Republicans are staying behind in DC because work still needs to be done. So while Nancy Pelosi is working hard on her book tour and the other Democrats like our own Joe Donnelly and Baron Hill are kicking their feet up and “chillaxin” back here in in the Hoosier state, real members of Congress are putting off their recess because they know work isn’t done. Many congressional Republicans came home over the weekend to spend time in the District, but then went back to DC to continue the fight against $4 (or more….I mean, how high does it have to go before someone acts!) gas.
Since Speaker Pelosi controls the cameras on the House floor and no other cameras are allowed in the House chamber, you can follow the action on the Floor in real time thanks to Congressman John Culberson and others via their Twitter feeds as well as Congressman Culberson’s Qik.com feed (yep, that’s live streaming video from his cell phone)
Welcome to Congress in real time!
August 4th, 2008 at 3:40 pm
It’s pretty interesting that even with CSPAN being censored, turned off by the Speaker like a Chinese Politburo, and no lights or microphones … blackberries and twitter, video-phones and Qik … are being used to get a story out that the media just doesn’t want to hear.
August 4th, 2008 at 4:14 pm
the fight against $4 (or more….I mean, how high does it have to go before someone acts!) gas.
Uh, have you been asleep?
Here in Lancaster, PA, the price has dropped to $3.65 today; it got to $3.98 or $3.99 before it headed south when the crude oil prices dropped.
In Fort Wayne, it’s $.374 today at Meijer, at Sam’s, and at Speedway.
And what kind of action are you expecting, anyhow? McCain wants to make a gift to the oil companies of all that tax money used for maintaining our interstate highways and bridges. I know gas prices are high, but the last thing I need is to have a bridge collapse under me, like the one on Interstate 35W did. Three out of four bridges are structurally deficient!
If we have jobs, we can afford $4 gas - and we really need to put people to work for a couple of years, rebuilding bridges, highways, and other infrastructure. Not “makework”. Just critical work that’s overdue.
August 4th, 2008 at 5:41 pm
“If we have jobs, we can afford $4 gas”
I beg to differ… Scott Fluhr I’ll let you answer this one - you made your point so well during the podcast recording session last Saturday.
Here in Indianapolis the price of petrol ranges from $3.59 to $4.20 per gallon.
More importantly to the overall economy - diesel. Diesel is anywhere from $4.29 to $4.95 per gallon.
source: IndyGasPrices.com
“McCain wants to make a gift to the oil companies of all that tax money used for maintaining our interstate highways and bridges.”
Hmmm… I seem to recall he wanted a temporary holiday from the fuel tax. I don’t see anything there that would claim it would go to the Big Bad Evil Oil Companies. Or are you saying Big Oil is just evil and greedy? Oh right you’re reading from the DCCC talking points bulletin.
August 4th, 2008 at 6:35 pm
The way that wholesale gas prices are set is completely isolated from the gas taxes. In other words, we (my company and all of the other oil companies) set a “rack price” and then the taxes are added on top of that. The reason is that taxes vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction (e.g. Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky, etc.) and people may buy from a terminal in Mt. Vernon, IN and take the gas to Kentucky.
So the reality is that a cut in the gas tax, while causing a void in the road maintenance “trust fund” (sic, since it is NOT a trust fund), it would not effect the bottom line of the oil companies. They would not charge more in order to make up the difference.
That being said, there is no evidence that a loss in money going into the trust fund would impact any road maintenance projects. But it would cause us to run greater deficits.
A more entertaining proposal would be to cut the Fed tax in half from 18.x% to 9%.
August 4th, 2008 at 6:36 pm
I’m not sure harldelos is reading from the talking points (in fact I believe he came to our defense against Craig Skinner in one of his useless posts), but he’s trying to get to the heart of the matter.
That said, I don’t agree with his points.
August 4th, 2008 at 6:37 pm
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