From: mjvande@pbhye.PacBell.COM (Mike Vandeman)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: Save the Planet and the Economy at the Same time!
Date: 23 Dec 92 15:34:42 GMT
Reply-To: mjvande@PacBell.COM (Mike Vandeman)
Organization: Pacific * Bell, San Ramon, CA

--     The world is broke. We need a source of funds to pay off the
--national debt, protect our citizens, and protect the environment.
-
-Is there no need to use funds to produce goods and services?  I guess not...
-we have plents of all that, right?
 
Those ARE services. Turn on brain, before putting mouth in gear.

--It should be a sustainable source, not achieved by liquidating more
--of our natural resources.
-
-Is the money of "rich people" a sustainable resource?
 
Yes, given human nature (greed).

--     The answer is staring us in the face: take it from the rich,
--who have far too much already. 
-
-Who is "rich"?  By what standard do you judge that they have "too much"?
-Too much for what?  Why is it any of your business to tell other people 
-whether they can EARN that money?  If you want to spend it, YOU earn it.
  
Who said they EARNED it? Why are you defending the rich? They are
robbing you blind. (And blind you are.)

--It is obvious that much that is
--wrong with our country is due to the unconscionable gap between the
--rich and poor. 
-
-By what standard do you judge that people who have earned their income  and
-have become rich by their own effort do not deserve their money, while those
-who have not earned it do?  It may offend your knee-jerk sentimentality,
-but you'll have to provide us with stronger stuff if you hope to win any
-converts.
 
By their own efforts? Are you kidding? By the sweat of a lot of underpaid
drones.

-What do you think that these aweful rich people do with their money?  Stash
-it in a mattress?  Spend it all on luxuries?  Obviously your (constantly
-mentioned) PhD is NOT in economics.
 
Stash it in capital assets that benefit hardly anyone.

--But the key is How do we identify the "rich" and
--________________________________________________
--their "excess" wealth, in an equitable (nonarbitrary) way?
--_________________________________________________________ 
-
--     The answer is simple. We already know that the automobile and
--its relatives and accoutrements (e.g. roads, CFC-containing air
--conditioners, used tires, etc.) constitute the world's greatest
--threat to our environment and quality of life. 
-
-Actually, a look at the greatest threat (by a VAST margin) to our environment
-and quality of life is having leftists dictators such as yourself ordering
-people around at gunpoint, looting, and ruining the economies of most of the
-world.
 
Now you are really out of touch. Who is the dictator? Where are the guns?
Europe & Japan have much higher taxes than we do, but it hasn't seemed to
"ruin" their economies, has it???

--We also know that
--the rich own and operate motor vehicles more than the poor. 
-
-Really?  Actually, their cars tend to be more expensive, but you can only 
-drive one car at a time.  If anything, rich folks generally have more
-control over where they live and thus might actually live closer than 
-average to their places of work.
 
I doubt it. They can also afford to travel farther. That would make a
good study, because I doubt that their lifestyle is any better than mine.

-Of course, the real question is where you get off telling anyone else 
-how much to drive, how to travel, or what have you?
 
I didn't do that at all. You forgot to turn on your brain. I just
suggested increasing the COST.

--The
--___
--answer is to apply appropriate taxes to the ownership, fuelling,
--________________________________________________________________
--and operation of automobiles and other motor vehicles,
--______________________________________________________
--approximately in proportion to the damage they do.
--_________________________________________________ 
-
-Cars do damage?  To whom?  How much?  Why should the government get this money
-rather than the "victims"?
 
To fix the damage you are doing.

--     This would have numerous beneficial effects: it would humanely
--                                                  _________________
--reduce the use of motor vehicles, 
--_________________________________
-
-What's so humane about taking away yet another of my options?  Why is it
-humane to rule others against their will?
 
Because that's not what I am suggesting. You still have the option. It
will just be more expensive. Did I take away your option of commuting
by helicopter? No, it's just too expensive.

--conserving our natural resources
-
-"Our" resources?  For the time being at least we still have private property
-in this country.  If you want to go the next step and explicitly nationalize
-all private property, you could simplify this and just say:
 
Most are on public lands.

--for more essential, environmentally sound uses (e.g. making
--toothbrushes). 
-
-What right do you have to tell the manufacturers or users of cars OR tooth
-brushes how to do their business?
 
Where did you get that idea? I am only increasing the cost, not telling
anyone what to do.

--It would not force anyone to stop driving; they
--                            _____                             
--could continue to do so, 
-
-The power to tax is the power to destroy.  Your goal is to make it impossible 
-for some people to drive my making it too expensive.  Be honest about it.
-If I proposed a tax on Noam Chomsky books (something I would not recommend, by
-the way) you would scream bloody murder.  How is this different?
 
You are right, but I don't think anyone would vote for such a stupid tax.
Taxing pollution is just good sense.

--if they simply pay a fair charge to do it:
-
-Fair by what standard?
-
--it preserves our individual rights and freedoms. 
-
-Being ordered around by the likes of you hardly preserves my rights and
-freedoms.  Can you even define what a right is and why we have them?
-If you think expanding government control over honest and peaceful behavior
-is an example of "preserving individual rights", you need to do a little
-remedial reading.
 
What is honest about you polluting my air? Are there no crimes, in your
mind?

--At the same time,
--it provides much-needed funds 
-
-Needed by whom?  You and your social planner buddies?
-
-I must ask again, where would that money have gone otherwise?  Where would it
-have been invested?  How many more goods would have been used to make
-people's lives better?  How many jobs will be wiped out?  How many works of
-art will go unfinished?  How many students will have to drop out of school?
-How many more families will drop into poverty?  I know it's more CONVENIENT
-for you to ignore these economic realities, but reality doesn't ignore 
-them.
 
Who cares? It's not the quantity of jobs that is most important, but what
those jobs do. Why not employ all the homeless growing dope, if jobs are
so important?

--to shift emphasis from a wasteful,
--destructive habit 
-
-What makes you think that I choose to drive my car because of habit rather than
-rational choice?  I LIKE driving.  It is very convenient, and even if YOU
-don't agree, I'm not asking you to pay for my car and my gas.  You, however are
-demanding that *I* pay for your little schemes.
 
Only for the damage you do to others? Didn't your mother ever tell you to
clean up after yourself?

--to more essential uses (reducing the national
--debt, education, health and environmental research, habitat
--preservation, pollution reduction, public transit. etc.).
-
-Who gave you the authority to decide where MY money is best spent?
 
I'm not deciding anything. You are getting paranoid. It is still the
government that does that.

-How much do you think would be "enough" for these purposes?  How many
-lost jobs and failed lives are these goals worth?  Is giving up even more
-of our liberty worth it?  
 
Enough to end the dominance of the auto.

--     If too much money is provided (above that needed to repair the
--destruction caused by motor vehicles), some of it can be used to
--reduce the use of more regressive taxes, such as sales taxes and
--income taxes, which cause the rich/poor gap to widen, while
--providing little compensating benefit.
-
-Where do you get the idea that income taxes make the income gap wider?
-I pay a *LOT* more money in taxes than people who make less than I make do,
-and I get very little in return.
 
Not enough more, considering all the damage you do. And why should we
tax people for making money? Why reward good behavior?

-Be that as it may, what is wrong with people's income being the result of
-their creation of their own wealth?  Since not all people have the ability
-or ambition to EARN the same amount of money, it is only right that they
-should get differing amounts.  Who are you to tell me I should not control
-the results of MY labor?
 
So if I steal your bank accounts, then I deserve to keep it, as the
results of my labor???