Extreme greenies love to warn of the “climate crisis,” proclaiming an impending future catastrophe if the crisis is not addressed immediately (we’re looking at you Jay Inslee). Well, this week, state legislators got a front row look at just how urgent the crisis is in the minds of extreme greenies. And, given the type language that been so frequently tossed around, it must have come a quite a shock.
Elicott Dandy, a representative of far-Left groups Alliance for Jobs and Clean Energy and OneAmerica, testified before lawmakers against I-732, a “revenue neutral” tax that has won the ire of the fringe Left because it would not result with any money in their pockets. Dandy openly admitted that the groups she represents are “against putting a price on carbon because the proposal included a tax cut.”
Apparently, for Dandy and the extreme groups she represents, a tax cut is “too high a price to pay” to address the impending catastrophe that is climate change.
It would be a truly shocking statement if we were not so used to the Left’s unbearable hypocrisy when it comes to their illogical extreme “green” agenda. But, let’s be clear on what Dandy admitted: a policy meant to encourage carbon emission reductions is “too high a price to pay” if it involves tax cuts.
Or, to put it in language the Left so often employs, offering tax cuts is “too high a price to pay” for saving planet earth from an imminent catastrophe.
As Washington Policy Center’s Todd Myers points out, the truly disturbing admittance by Dandy isn’t even the worst part. The full statement by OneAmerica on behalf of all the other extreme “green” groups is “incoherent and contradicts itself at least twice.” Via the Washington Policy Center,
- Dandy says we can’t afford tax cuts because it would force cuts in other programs would harm the poor. In other words, there is a not a single other state program worth cutting to put a price on carbon. Despite claiming that climate change is the most important issue, this makes it clear that addressing climate change is the least important issue and isn’t worth cutting a single other program to address.
- After saying the tax cuts are too large, she then argued they were too small. Dandy said the “tax cuts for some businesses are insufficient to prevent leakage.” Put simply, the tax cuts aren’t big enough to offset the increase in the price of carbon-based energy. As a result, energy-intensive industries will close up and move overseas. This is known as “leakage,” because worldwide emissions aren’t reduced, they simply leak overseas. So, she claims the tax cuts are simultaneously too big and too small.
- Ironically, the statement from the environmental community then admits their own proposal assumes it will create the very leakage she claims to oppose. The statement says I-732 “fails to provide transition for workers in energy-intensive, trade exposed industries.” Back to claiming the taxes need to go up, the position of the Seattle environmental community is that the taxes that drive business out of Washington can be used to retrain the workers who lose their jobs. Rather than cutting taxes to keep the jobs in the state and stopping leakage, the statement from the coalition of green groups assumes I-732 will kill jobs and create leakage.
It would save a lot of time and energy if the far-Left would just come out and admit that all they ever really want on any given issue — including climate change — is to create an even bigger government, complete with stifling regulations and higher taxes.
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