November 14, 2007
The New York Times
By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN
Two dates — two numbers. Read them and weep for what could
have, and should have, been. On Sept. 11, 2001, the OPEC basket oil price was
$25.50 a barrel. On Nov. 13, 2007, the OPEC basket price was around $90 a
barrel.
In the wake of 9/11, some of us pleaded for a “patriot tax” on gasoline of $1 or
more a gallon to diminish the transfers of wealth we were making to the very
countries who were indirectly financing the ideologies of intolerance that were
killing Americans and in order to spur innovation in energy efficiency by U.S.
manufacturers.
But no, George Bush and Dick Cheney had a better idea. And the Democrats went
along for the ride. They were all going to let the market work and not let our
government shape that market — like OPEC does.
You’d think that one person, just one, running for Congress or the Senate would
take a flier and say: “Oh, what the heck. I’m going to lose anyway. Why not tell
the truth? I’ll support a gasoline tax.”
Not one. Everyone just runs away from the “T-word” and watches our wealth run
away to Russia, Venezuela and Iran.
I can’t believe that someone could not win the following debate:
REPUBLICAN CANDIDATE: “My Democratic opponent, true to form, wants to raise your
taxes. Yes, now he wants to raise your taxes at the gasoline pump by $1 a
gallon. Another tax-and-spend liberal who wants to get into your pocket.”
DEMOCRATIC CANDIDATE: “Yes, my opponent is right. I do favor a gasoline tax
phased in over 12 months. But let’s get one thing straight: My opponent and I
are both for a tax. I just prefer that my taxes go to the U.S. Treasury, and
he’s ready to see his go to the Russian, Venezuelan, Saudi and Iranian
treasuries. His tax finances people who hate us. Mine would offset some of our
payroll taxes, pay down our deficit, strengthen our dollar, stimulate energy
efficiency and shore up Social Security. It’s called win-win-win-win-win for
America. My opponent’s strategy is sit back, let the market work and watch
America lose-lose-lose-lose-lose.” If you can’t win that debate, you don’t
belong in politics.
“Think about it,” says Phil Verleger, an energy economist. “We could have
replaced the current payroll tax with a gasoline tax. Middle-class consumers
would have seen increased take-home pay of between six and nine percent, even
though they would have had to pay more at the pump. A stronger foundation for
future economic growth would have been laid by keeping more oil revenue home,
and we might not now be facing a recession.”
As a higher gas tax discouraged oil consumption, the Harvard University
economist and former Bush adviser N. Gregory Mankiw has argued: “the price of
oil would fall in world markets. As a result, the price of gas to [U.S.]
consumers would rise by less than the increase in the tax. Some of the tax would
in effect be paid by Saudi Arabia and Venezuela.”
But U.S. consumers would have known that, with a higher gasoline tax locked in
for good, pump prices would never be going back to the old days, adds Mr.
Verleger, so they would have a much stronger incentive to switch to more
fuel-efficient vehicles and Detroit would have had to make more hybrids to
survive. This would have put Detroit five years ahead of where it is now. “It’s
called the America wins program,” said Mr. Verleger, “instead of the
petro-states win program.”
We simply cannot go on being as dumb as we wanna be. If you hate the war in
Iraq, then you want a gasoline tax so you can argue that we can pull out of
there without remaining dependent on an even more unstable region. If you want
to see us negotiate with Iran, not bomb it, you want a gasoline tax that will
give us some real leverage by helping to reduce the income of the ayatollahs.
If you’re a conservative and you believed that the Iraq war was necessary to
drive reform in the Middle East, but the war has failed to do that and we need
“Plan B” for the same objective, you want a gasoline tax that will reduce the
flow of wealth to petrolist leaders who will never change if all they have to do
is drill well holes rather than educate and empower their people.
If you want to see America thrive by becoming the most energy productive economy
in the world — a title that now belongs to Japan, which doesn’t have a drop of
oil in its soil — you want a gasoline tax, which will only spur U.S. innovation
in energy efficiency.
President Bush squandered a historic opportunity to put America on a radically
different energy course after 9/11. But considering how few Democrats or
Republicans are ready to tell the people the truth on this issue, maybe we have
the president we deserve. I refuse to believe that, but I’m starting to doubt
myself.
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) -- More than two dozen former
astronauts assembled Saturday at the Kennedy Space Center to honor the Astronaut
Hall of Fame's newest inductees also remembered Wally Schirra, one of the space
program's legendary old-timers.
Schirra, who died Thursday at 84, was one of the original Mercury Seven
astronauts and the fifth American in space. Colleagues recalled his steely
nerves and jokester's sensibility.
Saturday marked the Hall's induction of space shuttle astronauts Michael Coats,
Steven Hawley and Jeffrey Hoffman. But Schirra was the main honoree.
''Wally was a great gamester, a wonderful person ... He was a 'gotcha' guy,''
said former Apollo astronaut Al Worden. ''Wally finally got the ultimate gotcha
on us. He has a good excuse for not being here today.''
Worden, a captain in the Air Force, said Schirra, a captain in the Navy, was his
flight commander when he joined the astronaut corps in 1966.
''So I told him, 'Since we have the same rank, we have to approach this
relationship very carefully,''' Worden said, adding a pause. ''Next thing I
found myself doing was getting him a cup of coffee.''
The only Mercury astronauts still alive, former U.S. Sen. John Glenn and Scott
Carpenter, were at the induction ceremony but didn't speak.
Among Schirra's notable gags were smuggling a corned beef sandwich to the Gemini
3 crew so they could eat it in flight and giving Mission Control a deadpan
report of a UFO that matched a description of Santa Claus during the December
1965 Gemini 6 flight.
''We had a line between where there was fun and where there was business,''
Gunter Wendt, a launch pad leader who helped Mercury, Gemini and Apollo
astronauts get into their spacecraft, said Saturday. ''We never crossed that
line, but we had our 'gotchas.' We had our jokes.''
Wendt recalled that after three astronauts died in the Apollo 1 launch pad fire
in 1967, Schirra became more serious.
Schirra commanded the succeeding Apollo 7 mission in 1968, a flight that
restored the nation's faith in the space program after the Apollo 1 disaster.
Schirra also flew on the Sigma 7 Mercury mission in 1962 and the Gemini 6
mission in 1965, becoming the only astronaut to fly in all three of NASA's
original manned spaceflight programs.
''After the fire, he changed quite a bit,'' Wendt said. ''He was always a
happy-go-lucky guy, but now he knew he had to do better than that.''
Schirra could be demanding, but he appreciated blunt honesty, Wendt said.
During a redesign of the Apollo spacecraft, Schirra complained repeatedly about
the alignment of the windows to managers at the manufacturer. Finally, Wendt
told him, '''Hey Wally, we've modified it now three times. That's the best we
can do. If you don't like it, let somebody else fly that damn thing,''' Wendt
said.
Apparently satisfied with the answer, Schirra turned to Wendt and said,
''Why
didn't anybody explain it to me like that?''
