Why Do Speaker Pelosi & House Democrats Want to Make Gasoline More Expensive?
Speaker Pelosi Acknowledges that "More Supply Lowers the Price," But Opposes Increasing the Supply of American-Made Energy
Washington,
May 5, 2008 -
At her press briefing last Thursday, Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) acknowledged one of the universal truths of supply and demand when she said “certainly more supply lowers the price.” But when it comes to rising gasoline prices – which today are $1.28 more per gallon than when Rep. Pelosi became Speaker – House Democrats have OPPOSED increasing the supply of American-made energy at every opportunity. It’s an issue that puts the Speaker on the defensive, especially considering that San Francisco has the highest average gas prices in the nation. According to the Associated Press, “The highest average was in San Francisco at $3.95.”
But Speaker Pelosi and House Democrats don’t seem to mind the high prices. In fact, they want to make gasoline even MORE expensive. Two prominent Democratic committee chairmen have proposed gas tax increases of up to 55-cents per gallon. House Energy & Commerce Committee Chairman, Rep. John Dingell (D-MI), has proposed increasing the federal gas tax by an additional 50 cents. And Transportation & Infrastructure Committee Chairman James Oberstar (D-MN) has proposed at least a five-cent tax hike of his own, which he confirmed again last week. Taken together, that's an additional 55 cents per gallon on top of the already painful Pelosi Premium!
Republican Leader John Boehner (R-OH) last week stated plainly that Democrats want to make gasoline more expensive:
| "Not only do Democrats have no plan to lower gas prices, they actually want to increase them. We’ve got Chairman Dingell wanting his 50 cents a gallon tax on gasoline to fund his climate change proposal. You’ve got Chairman Oberstar yesterday, says he wants an increase in gas taxes in order to fund infrastructure. I have to ask Speaker Pelosi. Does she support increasing gas taxes as two of her chairmen have called for over the course of this year? The American people don’t want high gas prices, they’re tired of it and Congress ought to be doing something to deal with it.” (AUDIO) |
In the two years since then-Minority Leader Pelosi promised the American people a “commonsense plan” to lower gas prices, not only has she refused to reveal it, but prices have actually risen at an incredible pace – from $2.33 on January 4, 2007, the day Rep. Pelosi took the Speaker’s gavel, to $3.61 today. And among those hit the hardest by this $1.28 Pelosi Premium are working families, small business owners and employees, and local communities from coast to coast, which have been forced to cut critical services such as school bus transportation and law enforcement.
With Speaker Pelosi’s hometown facing the highest gas prices on record, will she support a more than 50 cent gas tax increase proposed by her committee chairmen? And where is that “commonsense plan” to lower gas prices she promised? Families and small businesses are looking to their elected leaders to help ease the strain of record gas prices, not higher taxes that will squeeze family budgets even further.
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