Another Democrat wants higher taxes

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Aug. 19, 2007

Las Vegas Review-Journal

EDITORIAL: Another Democrat wants higher taxes

Doesn't Washington already have enough money?

Shortly after this month's Interstate 35W bridge collapse in Minneapolis, which killed at least nine people, Rep. Jim Oberstar, D-Minn., proposed a 5-cent increase in the federal government's 18.3-cent-per-gallon gasoline tax to pay for bridge repairs across the country.

According to a federal audit, more than 70,000 bridges in the United States are structurally deficient -- including the Minneapolis span that crumbled. Repairing all of them would cost about $200 billion over the next 20 years, according to the American Society of Civil Engineers.

Rep. Oberstar, chairman of the House Transportation Committee, cast his proposed tax increase as a moderate request that would funnel about $8 billion per year into a fund that would be dedicated exclusively to bridge and highway repairs. (Now where have we heard that kind of assurance before? Social Security, anyone?)

"If you're not prepared to invest another five cents in bridge reconstruction and road reconstruction, then God help you," Rep. Oberstar told the Rochester Post-Bulletin.

Nothing like shaming the masses to convince them cough up more of their hard-earned cash.

Add Rep. Oberstar's plan to about a half-dozen other pending Democratic proposals that involve taking more money out of your pocket.

But Rep. Oberstar and his ilk can't avoid the most obvious question, one that should be raised anytime a subordinate asks his boss to bolster his expense account: What are you doing with the rest of your money?

Rep. Oberstar would have Americans believe there isn't a spare nickel in all of Washington. As the watchdogs at Citizens Against Government Waste so dutifully point out, Congress has spent more than $69 billion on frivolous pork over the past three years alone. The 2005 highway bill, which was larded up with low-priority projects including Alaska's "Bridges to Nowhere," already allocates $2 billion per year for bridge repairs.

Rep. Oberstar himself partook in the 2005 porkfest, scoring $14.6 million for his Duluth-area constituents, primarily to extend the nation's longest paved recreation trail.

Now Rep. Oberstar wants all of Congress to go cold-turkey on earmarks. He assures us that despite the hundreds of billions of dollars wasted on earmarks and low-priority road projects over the years, the madness will finally stop if only his 5-cent per gallon gasoline tax increase is passed.

"Yes," taxpayers will reply. "Just as the 1986 Immigration Reform & Control Act was the absolute last amnesty Congress would ever award to illegals."

It's good that Rep. Oberstar has sworn to adhere to fiscal responsibility, but not unexpected that it took a disaster in his own back yard to make him realize that Congress has been derelict in maintaining federal infrastructure. Had he and his spendthrift colleagues paid attention to their duties and fought for this principle but a few years ago, he wouldn't have to ask for a tax increase.

If there is a consensus in Washington that bridge and highway repairs must be a higher priority in the federal budget, lawmakers should simply cut back on the pork and have the Transportation Department make it a significant priority.

Let's be clear: There is absolutely no reason for Congress to raise taxes for anything, let alone for a few billion dollars worth of maintenance and repairs.

Fortunately, Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, has dismissed Rep. Oberstar's idea, and President Bush has pledged a veto.

Congress is still the spoiled teen who runs up Daddy's credit cards on outfits she'll wear only once. Maybe if lawmakers learn to be responsible with other people's money, they won't have to ask for so much more, so damn often.

http://www.lvrj.com/opinion/9245426.html