It also gives you an idea of how Nancy would act with a Hillary presidency.

Suddenly Nancy would be strongly against things proposed by the president, rather than a pushover as she is with Bush.

That's 100 million cars.

Now if you say that each one of those cars uses 12 gallons per week on average, lets crunch some numbers.

What you come up with is the possibility that a Republican talking point can go like this:  

House Democrats denied a 228 Million dollar tax break for the middle class!

Now of course no one can prove that's what would have happened.  Econ101 says it would not have.  And anyone with a brain will know that a 228 million dollar tax break only works out to like 28 bucks per person in the middle class, etc. etc.

Just mulling over the politics involved here.  And I find it odd what talking points we live in fear of and which one's we validate going forward.

But I return to the symbolism, after eight years of having the government put corporations over people, it's a powerful symbol for democrats to send that they are going to do what they can to put people first.

So what does the Democratic leadership do, immediately announce that the plan that would try to shift the economic burden from people to corporations, at least temporarily, is DOA.  No wonder Democrats lose elections.  

But, hey, Pelosi did say that it was dead because it would interfere with the other things Democrats are trying to do to lower the price of gas.   So apparently there is some plan, some where to help lower gas prices (although it's a super secret plan apparently).    I can't help but wonder if it is similar to all the things democrats are doing to end the war in Iraq?  Because it seems about as effective given that my neighborhood cheap-o gas station is at $3.81 a gallon.  

As for Obama, his last ad claimed the way to fix gas prices is to fix Washington.  If I have to wait for him to fix Washington, I'm going to be paying $8 a gallon.

peaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said "there's no reason to believe that any moratorium on the gas tax would be passed on to the consumer." She has left the measure off the list of energy proposals that she may try to attach to the supplemental Iraq war-spending bill.

Please, please, please step back and look at the forest.  This is 100% cynical and manipulative politicking.  Never mind that economists say it makes no financial sense.  It has 0% chance of being passed, hence it is 100% fiction, it will 100% have no effect on anyone this summer, and HRC and McCain know it.  I genuinely feel sorry for the HRC supporters wasting time promoting this, HRC is playing you for fools if you don't know this isn't going anywhere.  Or maybe, you do know that this gas stuff is bogus, but you prefer to have blind allegiance to HRC rather than a commitment to sensible public policy; well, that's even more sad than those who are being tricked by HRC on this issue.

Anyway, the one thing this episode does reinforce is the idea that HRC can't get major legislation passed that effects all Americans or the world (e.g. being the top D on gov. accountability and expanded international arms control or one of two top Ds on major ethics reform.)

The Obama campaign, with the backing of economists, say this is pointless. This will have no effect on gas prices, since a drop in prices will cause demand to rise, leading to an increase in prices.

Fine. In other words, gas will cost pretty much the same whether the tax is 0 cents or 18 cents.

Okay, now what happens if the gas tax is 30 cents, or 60 cents, or a dollar, or more? The same reasoning would indicate that prices should still be rather stable, no? And then the government gets the money, instead of the oil companies. So shouldn't Obama and economists be advocating raising the gas tax? If lowering the tax won't drop prices, why should raising it increase taxes?

speculation

  3. sticker shock after gas tax holiday ends.

so because it would end at some point there is no reason to do it

  4. increased consumption and in turn, increased greenhouse gases.>

sepculation

   5. layoffs for road construction crews and further neglect of infrastructure (windfall profit tax is not going to pass if gas holiday passes)

misinformation

  6. Democrat sides with Republican to double team likely Democratic nominee.

I regard this issue in the same fashion. Neo-classical economic technocrats are always on-hand to provide their sagacious and scientific "consensus" on the Very Dire Consequences of Failing to Hold a PhD in Economics. Unfortunately, even among progressives, for folks like Atrios, Krugman, and DeLong, representative democracy ends right at the moment it approaches the Very Dire and Immutable Laws of Economics.

It is not so much that there are laws and principles that economists agree on (see Greenspan spin in the political winds for 20+ years), it is that they resort to certain rhetorical tricks to shore up whatever side of a Very Dire Tax Proposal they support.

Reduce consumer taxes, raise corporate taxes on "windfall profits" - that is nothing more than a "shell game," a political demagoguery. Reduce taxes to reduce prices, that only increases profits - political plutocracy. ("What stoopid plebs we economists must endure!")

However, to support the first proposition, they must assert that there is no such thing as "windfall profits." Profits are the profits "that the  market will bear." To support the second proposition, on the other hand, they must assert that cutting consumer taxes can only produce "windfall profits."

Using the estimated coefficients, we can determine the incidence of federal and state specific taxes. An increase in the federal tax by 1¢ raises the retail price by 0.47¢ and decreases the wholesale price by 0.56¢. Thus, consumers and wholesalers each pay roughly half of the federal specific tax.