Wednesday, July 20, 2016

Gas Prices and Sen. Ann "Gas Tax" Rivers: The why on why I won't vote for her.

So, I'm watching one of the early morning financial networks, they release the current oil/gas inventories (Oil down 2.3 million barrels, gasoline inventory up 900K when it was expected to be unchanged) and oil immediately fell to $43.97.

One of the talking heads indicated that he'd bought gasoline (presumably regular) in New Jersey and the cost was $1.89 per gallon.

Well, I just paid for my tabs.  Last year, they were something like $64.

This year, thanks to Sen. Gas Tax, I was privileged to fork over a paltry $101.

Thanks to Gas Tax Rivers, that's a little bit of an increase, all in, in one year: a roughly 58% uptick.

I was pondering the price of gasoline in New Jersey... and wondering why it was so very much higher here.  I just checked, for example... and the cheapest cost shown was $2.27 per gallon, a 38 cent difference.

Of course, state gasoline taxes in New Jersey, a democrat dominated state not unlike our own, save for a GOP governor... are 14.5 cents per gallon.

Here in Washington, again, thanks to Gas Tax Rivers, they are astronomically higher... 49.4 cents per gallon... a difference of around 35 cents per gallon.

Around 21% of every gallon of gas we buy goes to pay for King County's transportation projects... utterly worthless wastes of billions.

Rivers is personally responsible for hanging a $700 million bill around the necks of the citizens of this county and we have practically nothing to show for it.

Remember the math, ladies and gentlemen:  as of 2015, there were 459,495 people living here in Clark County.  Divide that number into the $700 million that Gas Tax Rivers admits to, and the cost for every man, woman and child in this county is a paltry $1523 and change.

Each.

Family of 4?

Just under $6100.

Thanks to Rivers, who famously pledged to OPPOSE any increase in the gas tax or tab fees, claiming that


"The people have spoken and I have listened."

Seriously?  What would it be like if she had ignored us?

Rivers claims she ignored us because it was a "business decision."

It was one of a series of bizarre lies in that town hall meeting last January 9, including, perhaps, the biggest lie ever uttered by a local politician:

If I hadn't voted for the gas tax, instead of paying $700 MILLION, the people of Clark County would have had to pay $7 BILLION.



(Video credit to Brent Boger)

That's an utter and complete lie, of course: the gas tax in the GOP controlled senate passed 27 to 22.  Even if Rivers had kept her word to us and voted "no," it STILL would have passed.

But she didn't even try to keep her word.

And she has no regrets over betraying us; instead, her regret is in, according to her, making the pledge in the first place.

The political equivalent of asocial behavior, to be sure.

Combine that with Rivers' efforts to recruit another candidate against our incumbent Rep. Liz Pike because Pike opposed Rivers' gas tax bill...

And Rivers' deliberate refusal to explain her Town Hall Lies... and, well, any one of those would be reason, by itself, to vote against her.  Combined?

It's no contest.

Politics is a dirty, filthy business.  And this sorry episode by Rivers is among the dirtiest and filthiest it has been my misfortune to even be aware of, let alone be a part of.

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