Remember how John McCain was roundly mocked for suggesting a couple months' gas tax holiday, where we could all buy gas at the price for which it was being sold? It was actually an idea with bipartisan support; the host committee for the DNC convention has been using Denver's municipal pumps to avoid paying gas tax. This would be the gas that goes in the vehicles donated by GM for use by the committee. They've also been getting free car washes, presumably from city employees. It's not salt season, hi. Write "Hope! Change!" in the dust on your back window and go already.
Mayor Hickenlooper, whose surname makes him sound like a musical-theatre villain, uses the classic 9th-grade excuse: B-b-but, the RNC is doing it, too! "My understanding is in Washington or wherever where this happens on a regular basis, that it's standard operating procedure. I do know for a fact that they're doing the same exact thing in Minneapolis," he said yesterday. Cool, if by 'fact' you mean "Something I pulled directly out of my arse." According to Theresa McFarlane, spokeswoman for the RNC host committee in Minneapolis. "We're not getting a tax break on fuel. That's not the set-up at this end."
Time for a little math. You poor saps in Colorado pay 40.4 cents per gallon in state and federal fuel taxes. Mayor Hickenfooler has based his "Please. It's pocket change." defense upon the vehicles in question having a 14-gallon tank, so it's only a $5.60 ripoff of the rest of you per tank. Even at the Conoco in Lakewood that's the equivalent of 1.33 gallons of free gas per fillup; at the Western Convenience in Aurora it's almost one and a half. Now, about the average size of the gas tank. My Subaru four-banger has a 14-gallon tank, which I need to fill this morning at $4.26 a gallon. Lucky me. GM does make cars, but somehow I don't see the DNC tooling around in Saturns. I think maybe they tend more towards the Yukon, since that's what I see them riding around in in DC. That is more like a 25-gallon capacity, or a cool ten-spot per tank. I don't know for sure; I got that number off my ex's 1999 F-150 truck.
The point is, you're buying rich people gas for their free cars. And they're only stopping because they got caught at it. And instead of apologizing and paying their taxes like they expect you to they're making excuses you wouldn't accept from your children. Jerks.
About Me
- A.G. Clifton
- Miss Clifton was born in the back seat of a Greyhound bus rolling down Highway 21. The only child of itinerant grifters, she supplemented her family's meager income through faking food poisoning and stepping in front of cars. Later in life she discovered a talent for Faith healing. She toured the continent healing people named Faith. Along the way she met and married her son's father, but sadly, the two parted ways after she discovered what he actually meant by "animal husbandry." Miss Clifton lives in an abandoned railroad shed on the outskirts of town where she pursues her life's work of constructing the world's largest ball of aluminum foil. Donations cheerfully accepted.