🚀 go-pugleaf

> 8 Mar 1997
> 
> Southern California drivers could be charged by the mile
> 
> LOS ANGELES (AP) -- A proposed mileage tax could add $300 a year to the
driving 
> costs of Southern California motorists.

If you drive 40,000 miles a year, it could add $800!
 
> A charge-by-the-mile proposal is contained in a transportation plan being 
> drafted by the Southern California Association of Governments.

Sounds like an organization that needs immediate disbanding.
 
> Beginning in 2010, motorists would pay 2 cents per mile as gauged by an
annual 
> odometer check.

Keep the government's fucking nose out of my dashboard.

> The money -- $300 for someone who drives 15,000 miles per year -- would
raise an
>  estimated $1.5 billion for transportation projects in the greater Los
Angeles 
> area.

And 1/3 will be eaten up by brain-dead non-think tanks like SCAG (what a
perfect name).
 
> It also would discourage unnecessary driving, supporters argue.

How do these pinhead differentiate between necessary and unnecessar
driving? Why do they want to charge the same for both? I think if we don't
pay these bureaucrats, that will discourage them from coming up with
idiotic ideas like this.

> ``If people have to pay a couple pennies to drive their car to the grocery 
> store, maybe they'll walk,'' said Ron Bates, a Los Alamitos city
councilman and 
> member of the regional planning board.

Let me go on record as saying that Ron Bates is, perhaps, the dumbest
motherfucker on the planet.

Most people drive only a few miles round trip to the grocery store. Is 10
cents or less going to matter. Only to someone as stupid as Ron Bates,
apparently. How many fucking trips is someone supposed to make if he has a
big family? Now we're down to being only to transport what we can carry?
What sort of fucking third world wet dream does Ron Bates have in mind for
our state?

Did I mention that I think Ron Bates, a Los Alamitos city councilman, is
an idiot?

> The fee, which would require approval of the state Legislature, is needed 
> because gasoline taxes that traditionally paid for roadways and other 
> transportation costs are bringing in less money as cars get more fuel
efficient,
>  supporters say.

Blah, blah, blah.
 
> ``It's time to pay the piper,'' said Deborah Redman, a senior planner
with the 
> government association. 

Hello? Deborah Redman? You're an arrogant asshole. Why don't we eliminate
jobs like hers?

> ``We can be foresighted and assess ourselves the cost of
>  keeping our global competitive edge, or we can let things deteriorate.''

And this is the way to do it? Fuck off.
 
> The transportation plan is sure to face considerable opposition in the public 
> comment period before it is approved in August.

Right on!

> On Monday, the board of the Orange County Transportation Authority will
consider
>  opposing the driving tax.

Good guys.
 
> ``It's a terrible idea,'' said Orange County Supervisor Jim Silva, an
OCTA board
>  member.

Whew! Not all politicians are idiots. Good job, Jim.

- Don

-- 
"I don't believe you can find any evidence of the FACT that I had changed government policy solely because of a contribution" - President Clinton, 3-7-97