It's Always All About America

President Bush is upset that Asian and Latin American nations are subsidizing gas prices, thus protecting their citizens from the price spikes that have hurt Americans this year. These nations are doing so for a good reason--rising gas prices threatens their power. But more fundamentally, it's hard to feel bad for Americans. Although these subsidies are unsustainable at their current levels and ultimately are bad for the environment since they spur continued growth in oil consumption, they are also choices made by governments to support their poor and new middle class in their attempt to have a better standard of living.

But then Americans don't really care about that. We only care about maintaining our own outrageous use of resources at cheap prices. When this is threatened, it's someone else's fault, not ours. Our lack of consideration for other nations doesn't stop at gas prices though. Dave Noon quotes Kay Kagan's insistence that the only nation which counts in the Iraq war is the United States.

At the end of the day, the United States is not in Iraq for the benefit of the
Iraqis. American forces are not fighting to allow Iraqi leaders to make hard
choices. The U.S. is engaged in Iraq in pursuit of its own interests in fighting
terrorism and resisting Iranian destabilization and hegemony. Reconciliation
agreements within the Iraqi parliament are part of what is required to secure
those interests over the long term, but they are not now and never have been the
reason for the presence of American combat forces in Iraq.

This is how most Americans think about. Iraqis were never real people, either for the war supporters at home or for the government. Dave is outraged by Kagan's statements (as I am, for they are truly disturbing). But she's really only expressing how many Americans have always felt about this war. The fact that Iraqis may have thoughts of their own and are acting upon those feelings by pressing the U.S. to get the hell out of their country is very difficult for Kagan, the administration, and the Neocons to deal with. After all, weren't the Iraqis supposed to welcome us with open arms?

More broadly, this insular way of thinking typlifies Americans interactions with the world. The world exists to serve U.S. interests, feed us resources, and accept our power without questioning. When those nations do something really outrageous to defy the United States, we want to bomb them. But when they do small things, like subsidize their drivers or ask the U.S. to create a timetable for withdrawing from their nation, we are confused, not knowing how to respond and whining like babies without a bottle.

Pandering over the Gas Tax

Just before I asked her to join Alterdestiny, Sarah wrote a fantastic post about this ridiculous proposal to suspend the gas tax. She wrote:

Suspending the gas tax, sure, will make gas a few cents cheaper a gallon for the rest of the summer. And hell, I could use that few cents a gallon–it’ll add up.

But it will do NOTHING to alleviate the real problem, which is our dependence on a finite oil supply that largely comes from the Middle East, and it’ll also do nothing to stop the record profits of the oil companies. It’ll just take more money out of the government’s hands to do things that we desperately need it to do.

I could not agree more. This is pandering to the worst degree. Not only is it pointless and will make almost no difference to Americans' pocketbooks, but it is absurdly bad policy. I'm really disappointed in Clinton for supporting the idea. I expect bad ideas from McCain, but it is unacceptable for leading Democrats to support them.

First, how I can trust a candidate to deal with climate change who wants to give people incentives to drive more? I basically can't. On a similar issue, if we are at the point of suspending the gas tax, when we will decide to drill in ANWR, despite the fact that production there is years away and it only has a very small amount of oil? It can't be far off.

Second, as Sarah points out, our nation's infrastructure is falling apart. If anything, we need a higher gas tax to deal with this! Or do we want more bridge collapses like in Minneapolis? While it may seem that our tax money just disappears (and certainly this administration has come with many new and inventive ways to flush our money down the toilet), these taxes are necessary for making sure that our roads and bridges are safe when we drive. Eliminating the gas tax begs the question, where is the money for infrastructure going to come from?

Third, I want to fight for a society that stops talking about "tax burdens" and starts talking about all the good things taxes do for you. Like paying for your children's education, providing you with sewage lines, and making sure your bridges don't collapse when you are driving on them! This kind of rhetoric that Clinton is buying into does not help our nation in the least. It just reinforces the idea that taxes are a burden on Americans.

Besides, if you really want gas prices to go down, strengthen the dollar. But no one is talking about that. Why? Because it makes rich industrialists richer and props up the stock market at the cost of hurting poor Americans through higher gas prices.

Fourth, if this gas tax is suspended, will it ever come back? The answer is probably no. And again, where does the replacement revenue come from? Voters might be marginally happy that their gas goes down by 20 cents. But if the dollar remains weak and gas prices continue to rise, that will be erased quickly. Then, in a few months, the gas tax comes back? And we see a 20 cent jump in a day. You think any politicians are going to allow that to happen? No way.

Finally, this is just pandering. It's McCain and Clinton appealing to the most short-sighted desires of the American people. We don't need pandering, we need leadership. Obama's refusal to support the suspension of the gas tax is a good thing in my book, helping to make me believe that he is the best choice to lead the nation.