As I’m sure you are all aware, John McCain has proposed a 3-month gas tax holiday from Memorial Day to Labor Day… and Senator Obama has come out opposing the idea.
But, as the Wall Street Journal reported today, as a state senator in Illinois Obama supported a gas tax holiday.
Sen. Obama, who voted for a temporary gas-tax break when he was a state senator in Illinois, rejected a federal tax holiday as bad fiscal policy. The federal gas tax raises money to repair and expand the highway system.
In Illinois in 2000, Sen. Obama voted for a six-month, five-percentage point break on the state’s 6.25% gas sales tax. The reduction of the tax, which goes into a general revenue fund, passed on a 55-1 vote and included measures designed to ensure that the benefits of the tax break reached consumers. At one point, Sen. Obama jokingly asked on the Senate floor whether it would be possible to install placards on gas-station pumps telling motorists he had helped win temporary price relief.
Now that it’s John McCain making the proposal for temporary relief at the gas pump, Obama has flip-flopped.
The ironic thing about the whole issue of high gas prices is that Democrats and the special interests that support them are the ones to blame. Because of the environmental lobby, we don’t drill for oil in our country. They also oppose building more refineries. The end result: our continued (and not increased) dependence on foreign oil.
But maybe that’s what Barack Obama wants, afterall, he’s gets a lot of money from big oil:
Sen. Barack Obama continued accepting donations from oil company executives and employees last month even as he aired ads in which he stated he took no oil company money, his campaign finance reports show.
Obama has taken at least $263,000 from oil company executives, family members and employees since entering the presidential race last year, including $46,000 last month. At least $140,000 has come in chunks of between $1,000 and $2,300, the maximum permitted under federal law.
Texas oil executive Robert L. Cavnar of Milagro Exploration and his wife, Gracie, have helped the Illinois Democrat raise at least another $50,000 by helping host a fundraiser earlier in the campaign.
Higher prices means more profit for big oil right? If you ask Obama that’s how things are… But when he gets big money from Big Oil, how do you think he cares about how much you’re paying at the pump when they’re pumping up his campaign coffers?
UPDATE, by Mark Noonan: More on Obama’s Big Oil connections.
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