Tax Cuts

We are currently smack-dab in the middle of tax season. Understandably, the topic is on most of our minds.

Senate is currently debating a proposed bill that will roll back nearly $18 billion in tax breaks for large oil companies pushed through in 2005. The bill has already passed in Congress however, President Bush has already voiced intention to veto such a bill if it passes.

The Clean Air Act of 2007 languished in the Senate when the GOP opposed it. As the price of oil continues to climb, sentiments may be changing.

The revenues from the repeal of the breaks given to the oil companies (almost $18 billion over 10 years)would be used for tax incentives for wind, solar and other renewable energy sources.

Big oil, in a second year of record breaking profits, has been busy lobbying against the bill in Congress and the Senate. It appears they’ve already won over the White House.

Shouldn't an industry, whose five biggest producers generated $145 billion in profits in 2006, be able to sacrifice $1.7 billion in annual tax breaks to help develop the cleaner fuel alternatives our country needs?

In a 2005 address to the American Society of Newspaper Editors, President Bush spoke forcefully of the need for an energy strategy that looked to the long term and emphasized conservation and renewable fuels. Of the oil and gas industry, he said pointedly: “I will tell you with $55 oil we don’t need incentives to the oil and gas companies... There are plenty of incentives. What we need is to put a strategy in place that will help this country over time become less dependent.”

I would like to pose a question then: If President Bush felt this was true while the cost of crude oil was $55 a barrel, isn’t it even more valid and urgent at $100 a barrel?

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/04/20050414-4.html

http://www.pbs.org/now/shows/347/oil-politics.html

My reaction to "An Inconvenient Truth" with Al Gore

First of all, I am glad that I was given this assignment; otherwise I would have possibly never viewed this documentary. I remember hearing about it when it was first showed as part of the Sundance film festival, from friends who had later watched it in the theater or on DVD, and then when it received the academy award. I had honestly thought that a film about Al Gore talking about the environment would have been “boring”. I was wrong; this was not a boring film. Gore used words, images and concise facts to build a film that is fascinating and relentless to the cause.

It was very easy for me to forget that Al Gore had ever run for office or had been a politician. The film shows a personal, sometimes humorous, and passionate side of the man. Gore appears to be but a concerned citizen warning his fellow citizens of impending crisis. The documentary is based on a speech that Gore has been developing for many years. He stands before an audience of what appears to be college students, before a large screen that he uses to support his points with dramatic visuals. The visuals start with the famous “Earthrise” photograph, then later a series of space photographs that clearly show that glaciers and lakes are diminishing, shorelines are retreating, and the snows are melting.

A particularly significant part of the film for me was when the “debate” of Global Warming was discussed. "There is no controversy about these facts," he says in the film. "Out of 925 recent articles in peer-review scientific journals about global warming, there was no disagreement. Zero." And although there is "100 percent agreement" among scientists, a database search of newspaper and magazine articles shows that 57 percent question the fact of global warming, while 43 percent support it. These figures are the result, he says, of a disinformation campaign started in the 90s by the Big Oil industries to "reposition global warming as a debate." It is the same strategy used for years by the defenders of tobacco. Mr. Gore told the story of his father who was a smoker who died of lung cancer during times when the link between smoking and lung cancer was still "debatable". This comparison is profound. We still have time to react to the warnings, to save the “life” of the future.

I appreciate that Gore isn’t pessimistic about the situation. He isn’t presenting this as a political issue, but instead as a moral issue. Examples of what we can all do were given at the end of the film. We can switch to and encourage development of alternative energy sources (solar, tidal, wind). Move toward more energy efficient cars (especially electric and hybrid), and invest in more energy efficient appliances. We can vote to pour more money into public transit. The easiest of the recommendations was to save energy in our own houses. I did something funny after seeing this film; I went through my home, turning off all of the lights.

Below is the link to the official website for the documentary.

http://www.climatecrisis.net/