Washington State is facing a projected $13 billion shortfall over the next four years. But instead of facing the real problem—runaway government spending—Democrats in Olympia are reaching deeper into your wallet.
Carbon taxes, like the one here in Canada that’s currently being cancelled, manage to induce shrill complaints — including those by corporatized mainstream media. Except for high-income earners, Canadians are more than reimbursed via federal government rebate, yet the whining persists.
Meanwhile, many drivers of superfluously huge and over-powered thus gas-guzzling vehicles seem to consider it a basic human right. It may scare those drivers just to contemplate a world in which they can no longer readily fuel that ‘right’, especially since much quieter electric cars are for them no substitute.
Such disturbing mass addiction to fossil fuel products by the larger public undoubtedly helps keep the average consumer quiet about the planet’s greatest polluter, lest the consumer be deemed hypocritical. There’s a continuance of polluting, if not destroying, the natural environment with a business-as-usual attitude, like it all is somehow absorbed by the planet without repercussion to human wellbeing.
Also, here in the corpocratic West, if the universal availability of a renewable energy alternative would come at the expense of the traditional ‘energy’ production companies’ large profits, one can expect obstacles, including the political and regulatory sort. If something notably conflicts with corporate big-profit interests, even very progressive motions are greatly resisted, often enough successfully.
Greatly exacerbating this already serious problem is the large and growing populace who are too overworked, underpaid, worried and rightfully angry about food and housing unaffordability for themselves or their family, to have energy left to criticize big industry for the environmental damage it causes/allows, especially when not immediately observable.
It all must be convenient for big industry's profit interests — particularly when neoliberals and conservatives remain overly preoccupied with vocally criticizing one another for their relatively trivial politics and therefore divert attention away from some of the planet's greatest polluters and pollution, where it should and needs to be sharply focused.
The Governor admitted that is actually a $19 billion deficit.
I missed that! I wonder if that's "true" or just a talking point.
https://x.com/vijayinwa/status/1907290230270665190?s=46
Carbon taxes, like the one here in Canada that’s currently being cancelled, manage to induce shrill complaints — including those by corporatized mainstream media. Except for high-income earners, Canadians are more than reimbursed via federal government rebate, yet the whining persists.
Meanwhile, many drivers of superfluously huge and over-powered thus gas-guzzling vehicles seem to consider it a basic human right. It may scare those drivers just to contemplate a world in which they can no longer readily fuel that ‘right’, especially since much quieter electric cars are for them no substitute.
Such disturbing mass addiction to fossil fuel products by the larger public undoubtedly helps keep the average consumer quiet about the planet’s greatest polluter, lest the consumer be deemed hypocritical. There’s a continuance of polluting, if not destroying, the natural environment with a business-as-usual attitude, like it all is somehow absorbed by the planet without repercussion to human wellbeing.
Also, here in the corpocratic West, if the universal availability of a renewable energy alternative would come at the expense of the traditional ‘energy’ production companies’ large profits, one can expect obstacles, including the political and regulatory sort. If something notably conflicts with corporate big-profit interests, even very progressive motions are greatly resisted, often enough successfully.
Greatly exacerbating this already serious problem is the large and growing populace who are too overworked, underpaid, worried and rightfully angry about food and housing unaffordability for themselves or their family, to have energy left to criticize big industry for the environmental damage it causes/allows, especially when not immediately observable.
It all must be convenient for big industry's profit interests — particularly when neoliberals and conservatives remain overly preoccupied with vocally criticizing one another for their relatively trivial politics and therefore divert attention away from some of the planet's greatest polluters and pollution, where it should and needs to be sharply focused.