Guy has to walk 8 miles to work because he can't afford gas and upset that he can't help feed his

[Horse with no Name]

neighbors.

Good God.

That brought tears to my eyes.

This country is so fucked because this story won't even make it to the M$M.

Thank you Senator Sanders. When this country splits--I will come to where you are. You are a GOOD man.

[bobbolink]

1. Yet, "progressives" and environmentalists want to RAISE the federal tax on GAS, so MORE people can

walk 8 miles to work... or lose their jobs.

And, of course, taking care of the kids goes down the toilet, because it takes TIME to walk to work.

Could "progressives" begin to actually THINK of people who are in this position????

[toddwv]

3. We have thought of people in this positions.

Then the Republicans and their corporate buddies did all they can to kill decent public transportation in this country.

[Name removed]

6. Deleted message

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[JVS]

9. You're right. Price floors and taxes on goods always take it out on the poor. Rationing on the..

other hand is how you prevent over-consumption by the individual without squeezing the poor out of the marketplace.

[bobbolink]

11. Thank you! Refreshing to hear someone who actually understands this!

I hope you will speak out more on these proposals to raise the damned gas tax!

:yourock:

[DCKit]

39. The simple definition of "regressive taxation". n/t

[gratuitous]

13. What?

How much of an increase are we talking about? Right now, the federal gas tax is 18.4 cents per gallon, and hasn't risen in 17 years. Gas taxes are covering less and less of the cost of road building and maintenance, so the money for that is coming from somewhere. But where?

So, what's the proposed raise? A dime a gallon? How often do you fill a 12 gallon tank? Once a week? That's an increase of $1.20 a week, a little more than $5 a month. If that leads to improved roads, a person might spend less money replacing tires, shocks and other wear and tear on her vehicle, which could make that $5 a month a real bargain, when all costs of driving are taken into consideration.

Who's going to stop driving to work and walk every day because of the spectre of an extra $5 a month in gas taxes? Because I'll send those three people five bucks each month so the rest of us can better pay for our infrastructure.

[bobbolink]

14. Thank you for your concern. Would you please read #9, and hear Bernie's story?

We will happily ration the rest of you.

[gratuitous]

20. So two years ago, when gas was $4 a gallon

And every penny of that excess was fattening the coffers of Exxon/Mobil, Chevron, BP and the rest of the oil companies, everything was peachy. But the prospect of an extra $5 a month in federal gasoline tax (money that would go to the benefit of everyone who uses the roads) is the apocalypse?

Again, who's going to quit driving to work altogether if their monthly gasoline bill goes from $153.92 (12 gallons per fill up each week at the current national average of $2.96 per gallon) to $159.12? Especially considering the possibility of using two gallons of gas less per month, which would eliminate the increase in expense altogether? I guess that sort of economizing is unpossible! Nobody could cut back from 52 gallons of gas a month to 50 gallons! That would require some kind of super duper economizing beyond the ability of any mortal.

No, thank you for your concern!

[bobbolink]

22. You don't understand it because YOU aren't hurt by $5 a month.

I guess you have already forgotten about Katrina, when many were stranded because it was the end of the month and they were out of $$$ for gas. How easily that suffering is forgotten.

I asked you to read #9, but you would rather argue than to give any consideration to the fact that maybe there are some new issues to consider.

You spend years wanting to up the price of gas, and it is a shock that maybe that causes harm. Of course, it is harms people you don't consider worth your time, then it isnt' worth the consideration anyway.

RATION!

[gratuitous]

27. And you don't answer the question

Who, I'd like to know, is going to completely give up driving to work and lose their job because of a prospective increase (an increase they could avoid by simply consuming two fewer gallons of gas each month) of $5 a month in their gasoline bill? That's what you have asserted, but it's nothing you seem able to prove, preferring instead to whine about non-germane suffering and unfounded claims that I don't consider certain people worth my time.

Who is going to have to quit driving to work and lose their job?

Gee, big letters are fun, but they don't really constitute an argument, do they?

[bobbolink]

29. Maybe if you read the OP?????? The answer is obvious, but you don't want to hear it because you LOVE

REGRESSIVE taxes!

Try, just for one minute, to understand the difference between Progressive Taxes and Regressive Taxes.

And, yes, you totally disregarded the fact that so many were stuck in NOLA because they had NO MONEY for gas to get out. You think that is delightful, do you?

[JVS]

19. The problem is when people advocate the use of taxes to increase the price to a level that...

encourages decreased consumption. Think of cigarettes being taxed to $10/pack. These taxes achieve their goal through using the "free" market, although frankly it's a manipulation of the market. The point is that when you raise the price of a gallon of gas to $5 or $6 there will be various reactions to it. The well off will simply pay more, those at the margins of well off and poor may select cars differently, and the poor are just screwed.

[gratuitous]

23. How would gas go to $5 or $6 a gallon?

Right now, the current national average of a gallon of gas is about $2.96. The federal gas tax is $0.187 per gallon, and has been since 1993. Even a boost of a dime a gallon would make that gallon of gas cost only $3.06, which is a far cry from $6 or even $5 a gallon.

It's as much a manipulation of the market to have kept the federal gas tax at 18.7 cents per gallon for 17 years as it is to raise the gas tax a dime a gallon. See my earlier posts, where that figures out to be an increase of about $5 a month in a person's gas bill, or the cost of less than two gallons of gas. I hardly think the effort to economize two gallons of gas per month is going to so completely screw a person, but that's just me.

[JVS]

30. In my post I'm talking about taxing the gasoline to the price of $5 or $6 per gallon.

Which some here have said would be a good thing to do for the environment.

[bobbolink]

24. "And the poor are just screwed." That is what "progressives" don't want to grasp.

They are enamored of REGRESSIVE taxation.

[KamaAina]

16. This progressive environmentalist wants more public transit

even in rural areas, so NOBODY has to walk 8 miles to work!

http://www.ruralassembly.org/transportation

http://www.ruralassembly.org/sites/ruralassembly.org/files/Rural_Trans_Policy_Paper.pdf

[bobbolink]

18. That works for some... not all. RATIONING would work for ALL.

[Liberal_in_LA]

2. what guy? News story?

[nadinbrzezinski]

5. Letter Bernie just read

[Liberal_in_LA]

7. ok. thanks

[Bozita]

4. Bernie's taking a break from the letters. Says it takes a lot out of him.

I believe him!

[Obamanaut]

8. And there is absolutely no possibility at all of these letters, or that

particular story, being fabrications?

Have there not been instances of 'plants' in an audience, the State of the Union Address for example, in times past?

[Horse with no Name]

10. I don't know about you--but I am watching a man with more integrity

in his toenails than the rest of the Senate has in their whole entire bodies.
If he says these are real, I believe him.
I live in one of the poorest areas in Texas--I know how bad it is out there and I am sure if I talked to every one of them, I would hear similar stories.

[Obamanaut]

17. I was all hopey/changey two years ago, and look what happened.

Now, just because someone says racoon shit is blue, I think I'll check out some raccoon shit before I shout about a miraculous color change in animal droppings.

It is possible, because it has happened that politicians tell us what they think we want to hear in order to keep their jobs, that a good speech writer typed out some letters on his laptop today. It is possible you know. Stranger things have happened.

[enlightenment]

12. Your point?

Sen. Sanders is practicing the filibuster. He could read Alice in Wonderland or War and Peace or the telephone directory.

Or is the idea to try and cast aspersions at a decent progressive because he disagrees with the President? If that's the case, you might want to brush up on your civics - because 'lockstep' isn't in the Constitution.

[Obamanaut]

15. My point is why get weepy over letters that may or may not be true, that

may be a work of fiction. Engaging to read to an audience, but not necessarily the truth.

Reading anything to pass the time is fine, just as Mr Smith did in the movie, but spare the jerking of tears.

[Missy Vixen]

25. Why do you think he's lying about the letters?

Should he produce the letter-writers in person before you believe his comments?

What will you do when you discover those who penned the letters to the Senator are telling the truth?

:eyes:

[Obamanaut]

28. Why do you think politicians always tell the truth? Don't they spin

things in order to get elected and stay there?

How do we know that a speech writer didn't 'pen' those letters today on his little laptop?

The hopey/changey has worn off for me. I can hardly wait for another screen name change amnesty so I can go back to the original one.

[Missy Vixen]

31. Oh, I see

Senator Sanders is lying, while your choice is obviously telling the truth at all times.

>How do we know that a speech writer didn't 'pen' those letters today on his little laptop?<

How long do you think it would take to discover the letters Senator Sanders read on the floor of the Senate were false? How many news cycles would it dominate if they were? Do you think he would choose to flush his career down the toilet by doing so?

If you don't think the stories in those letters are tame, perhaps you need to call YOUR Senator's office and ask about some of the letters they've been getting lately from constituents. Then again, they're obviously making that up, too.

:sarcasm:

[Obamanaut]

36. I have come to believe that if an office seeker is not a weasel when

he/she seeks that office, weaseldom soon embraces them following election.

I don't vote for incumbents any more. If an incumbent has not filled his pockets sufficiently during one term, then he wasn't trying hard enough. A new one should be given the opportunity to feed at the trough for a time.

Many, if not most, vote for "the name you know", and keep weaseldom flourishing for an entire career for many.

I'm not saying Bernie Sanders is lying. I am saying that the letters may or may not be true. It may be that Sanders was duped. It may be that the office was inundated with phony letters from various sources. Any number of scenarios could exist. BTW - the Bambi and Lion King stories are not real either, and people got weepy over them as well.

[glowing]

41. For the most part, those letters are coming from Vermonters... People

who are normally steadfast and truthful and prideful.. If they are writing to their Senator (which a while back he had asked them to do to ask how they were), then they are writing truthfully. Its mostly small town and rural and people have to have each other's backs. If someone is sick, everyone takes a turn helping out, cooking, and cleaning... I read one story on the web site of familys using furniture and such to feed the fire.. and I beleive it.. There are very few really wealthy people.. and those that are normally came from somewhere else or live their part-time.

[enlightenment]

37. Next time you filibuster on the Senate floor, you can do it

the way you want to do it, okay?

Pushing the 'the letters may be made up' thing is pretty lame, though. Unless you have some proof of that, making that sort of comment makes you look a bit desperate.

[Obamanaut]

40. And if a letter is read that says "Raccoon shit is blue" would it be true

just because you heard it read on teevee, or would you wait until you saw some different colored animal droppings on the lawn?

[laughingliberal]

38. Well, it's obvious you've got gas money. Those of us who don't have no problem believing this story.

Whether that particular story is true or not, I know there are many like it.

[Luciferous]

32. My husband had a temp working for him who walked 12 miles to work

one day because his car broke down and he didn't have money to fix it. This was a couple of months ago. My husband arranged a reliable ride for him and he just got hired in a couple of weeks ago and is hoping to save up enough soon to move closer to work. He has 2 kids to take care of and had been laid off for a while before he got that temp job. So even if this story is a fabrication (which I don't believe) there are stories out there just like it.

[Quantess]

21. Somebody give this man a bicycle.

[Nikia]

26. That was my thought too

Before I got my license, I had a job 6 miles away which I got to in about a half hour by bike. That was doable. If I had to walk, I probably would have not taken it. Everyone has different biking and walking speeds, but biking would save him a lot of time, not to mention effort.

[bobbolink]

34. I'm sure you also dropped your kids off at daycare on the bike, too.

[laylah]

33. Link to the story, please,

ONLY because I want to share it. What a sad state of affairs. :cry:

Thank you for posting this, as painful as it is. :hug:

Jenn

[Horse with no Name]

35. He read it during the filibuster

I just shared it as I heard it.