The Democrat Gas Hypocrisy

Rush Limbaugh.com ^ | February 27, 2012 | Rush Limbaugh

[Kaslin]

RUSH: Michael Janovsky at the New York Times, April 24th, 2006, about six years ago: "Democrats Eager to Exploit Anger Over Gas Prices." This is back in 2006. The Democrats were running for office in the midterm elections trying to talk us into a recession. This is after they had failed at trying to talk us into failure in Iraq. "Democrats running for Congress are moving quickly to use the most recent surge in oil and gasoline prices to bash Republicans over energy policy, and more broadly, the direction of the country. With oil prices hitting a high this week and prices at the pump topping $3 a gallon in many places..." We're now over $5 in California. In 2006, with "prices at the pump topping $3 a gallon in many places Amy Klobuchar, a Democratic Senate candidate in Minnesota, is making the issue the centerpiece of her campaign. Ms. Klobuchar says it 'is one of the first things people bring up' at her campaign stops. To varying degrees, Democrats around the country are following a similar script that touches on economic anxiety and populist resentment against oil companies."

Yep!

"'It's a metaphor for an economy that keeps biting people despite overall good numbers,' said Senator Charles E. Schumer of New York..." What else do we have a Chuck-U? Oh, Chuck-U is in the news today, folks. Chuck-U tells Clinton to pressure Saudi Arabia to pump more oil. Senator Chuck-U Schumer "wants Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to press..." She's got her own section in the program today for her own rampant hypocrisy. (We'll get to that in due course.) Chuck-U Schumer "wants Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to press Saudi Arabia to boost output as rising prices are hitting consumer at the gasoline pump." Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa!

Wait a minute. More oil? Chuck-U wants more oil? Is that what asking the Saudis to do, pump more oil? Is that right? Is that what that means? Senator Schumer tells Clinton to pressure Saudis to pump more oil? He wants more oil? Then how come this regime vetoes the Keystone pipeline and has a drilling moratorium in the Gulf of Mexico and makes fun of/mocks the concept of producing more oil in the United States? So Senator Chuck-U Schumer is asking Senator Clinton to make us more dependent on foreign oil! That's what he's doing when he's asking her to pressure the Saudis, pump more oil. He wants us to be more dependent. He doesn't want to use our own oil. Obama doesn't want to use our own oil.

How come Chuck-U is not out there saying, "Everybody go buy a Volt?" How come Chuck-U's not saying, "Hey, everybody go buy a Prius, go buy a hybrid"? How come Chuck-U's not out there saying, "Get your tire gauge out and make sure the pressure is right and get a tune-up"? That's what Obama do. So the Democrats want more oil. They want the price to come down with more supply. Funny how that never works domestically. So 2006, New York Times: "Democrats Eager to Exploit Anger Over Gas Prices" -- at $3 a gallon. From BigGovernment.com Wynton Hall with the story: "Seven Gas Facts Obama Cannot Escape -- 1.

"In September 2008, Barack Obama’s 'Nobel-prize winning physicist' of an Energy Secretary, Steven Chu, told the Wall Street Journal: 'Somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe,'" which is much higher than what we pay. Obama has said he wants high prices. Why don't these guys come out and say, "This exactly what we want"? Steven Chu, the energy secretary, Nobel-prize winning physicist has advocated for higher prices. So has Obama. Now they're getting higher prices. You know why? They want higher prices so you'll have to go out and buy a Volt or a hybrid or get on a bus or get on a subway or take mass transit and become like a number.

A robot. An interchangeable part of the system, like a Chinese citizen taking orders and dictates from the state and their command-and-control economy. The truth is, they want higher prices. The problem is it's an election year. Can't advocate for higher gas prices in an election year. "2. In 2008, then-candidate Barack Obama admitted that, like his future Energy Secretary Mr. Chu, he believed that high gas prices would be a good thing because they would force Americans to ween [sic] themselves off of oil, but that he would have 'prefered [sic] a gradual adjustment.'" We had the sound bite last week. We reminded you of it when gasoline hit four bucks and Obama said: It's okay; it's okay. I'm just a little upset how fast it got there. 3. On January 19, 2009, the day before Barack Obama [immaculated] gas prices were $1.84 a gallon. As of February 20, 2012 a gallon of gas cost $3.59," and now it's close to $5 a gallon. And don't forget, in 2006 it was $3 a gallon, and the Democrats are out exploiting it and trying to turn it into a big political issue. "4. As Senator Kay Bailey Hutchinson points out, 'Offshore drilling permits are being issued at less than half the rate of the previous administration. The average number of leases issued on public lands is less than half than during President Clinton’s term.' 5. In 2008, Barack Obama seemed perfectly comfortable with soaring energy prices if they meant curbing greenhouse gas emissions.

"As Mr. Obama confessed: 'Under my plan of a cap and trade system, electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket.'" In their hearts and minds, Obama and the left are LOVING gas prices go up. They just can't say so. But they love it. And that's why there's not a huge effort to bring them down. There's a huge effort to make you think they want to, but how many stories have you seen where Obama says, "Ah, there's really not a whole lot the president can do"? And Jay Carney says, "Well, there's not a whole lot the president can do." In 2006, don't forget, Chuck Schumer and John F. Kerry (who, by the way, served in Vietnam) were mocking Bush for asking the Saudis to pump more oil! Arabs producing more oil makes prices go down, but somehow the US pumping more oil won't make any difference.

That's what they tell us. "Nah-nah-nah. That's the stupidest thing we ever heard of! That's a tired, worn-out cliché. 'Drill, drill, drill,' and for 30 years they've been saying that. That's what the Republicans always say. Just drill, drill. That's gonna take us two to three years!" Well, where would we be if 30 years ago we had just started drilling, drilling, drilling? Chuck-U Schumer in 2008: "Schumer to Bush: Stop 'Coddling' Big Oil, Saudis," and get on 'em and make 'em pump more. And Chuck-U wants Hillary to do the same thing now. Obama, he can lower the sea level but he can't lower the price of oil. "7. Try as he might, President Obama’s campaign will try to distance themselves from the fact that a central pillar of Mr. Obama's 2008 campaign was a pledge to reduce the 'pain at the pump' caused by high gas prices."

We can go back and we can get all of that audio that was a centerpiece of his campaign, a pillar, to reduce pain at the pump. But missing no opportunity to invoke class warfare, Obama said, "For the well-off in this country, high gas prices are mostly an annoyance, but to most Americans they're a huge problem, bordering on a crisis. Here in Indiana gas costs $3.60 a gallon," he said in 2008. Now it's 2012, we're over $5 a gallon, and there's not much we can do about it.

And from MSNBC: "8 Reasons Why Gas Will Hit $5 a Gallon This Year." I'll just read through them. Not gonna give you details. Number one, Strait of Hormuz. Number two, Iran. Number three, refiners raising prices. Number four, other geopolitical risks. Number five, the European Union may save itself. Number six, the US economic recovery means higher oil prices. Number seven, summertime. Number eight, supply risk. In all eight of these reasons, not one of them mention Obama or his energy policies. So we have every effort in the world being made to shield Obama from any relationship to high gasoline prices, despite what the Democrats did all during '05, '06, '07, and '08. We even have some Republicans now saying, "We really don't want to try to tie the president to this, market forces no president can control."

We said back in 2006 there's nothing Bush can do about it. The president does not have a magic wand. Releasing from the strategic reserves doesn't make a significant long-term difference in the price of oil. And people who said that back then want us to say something consistent now. "Well, come on, let's not jump on Obama for this. We all know honestly that presidents can't do anything about it." Bush was not choking the supply, however. Obama is. Obama is a factor in the price of gasoline. See, that's the difference, Obama is a factor in the price of oil. Obama wants higher oil prices, his energy secretary and he have both said so. They want higher oil price. This is not making it up. They want higher oil prices. It's less freedom. It's less mobility. It forces you into alternative buying decisions when it's time to get a new car. So Obama does have something to do with high oil prices.

END TRANSCRIPT

[thackney]

State taxes are on top of Federal Taxes.

For example, Gasoline in Alaska:
State Tax = 8¢/gal
Federal Tax = 18.4¢/gal
Total Tax = 26.4¢/gal

[nascarnation]

Here in Indiana we pay sales tax on gasoline, so the higher the price, the more tax we pay.

Funny I’ve never heard anybody say “windfall tax profits”

[thackney]

Note also, in Florida it is only 4¢/gal of the fixed state gasoline tax, but there was over 30¢/gal in variable taxes also added on to the price. See the right hand column and explanations.

So in Florida, at the time this was assembled, the tax was:
18.4 + 4 + 30.4 = 52.8¢/gal.

But that 30.4¢ is a variable term that goes up when the price goes up.

[thackney]

Indiana has some company in that market.

Several states now include percentage based taxes that automatically raise more money with higher prices.