CA: Taxing Peter to finance Paul (Prop 87--LA times calls Clintons "shilling" "embarrassing")

LA Times ^ | November 6, 2006 | Editorial

[calcowgirl]

Imposing a tax on your competitors to fund yourself is among the many reasons why Prop. 87 is such a bad idea.

HERE'S A STELLAR IDEA: Let's pass a tax on Internet companies to create a state fund that invests in worthy newspapers. That's basically akin to what alternative energy venture capitalists are proposing to do with Proposition 87 — tax your competitors (the oil industry) to fund yourself.

Private capital is flooding into the alternative energy sector already, but you'd hardly know it from the glamorous Yes on 87 campaign. That's because the measure's backers appear to be managing a film awards ceremony rather than a political campaign. ...

Bill Clinton! The former president is on the side of the starlets and is featured in the most stirring TV ads . . . With all due respect to a former president we admire, his shilling for this initiative is, well, embarrassing. He should know better than Alyssa.

Did we mention that venture capitalists with investments in alternative energy firms are huge donors to the campaign? There is nothing to prevent such investors from sitting on the board that allocates the research money generated by the proposition, which is precisely the conflict-of-interest problem that has tainted California's last experiment with taxpayer-funded research, 2004's stem cell initiative.

(snip)

We don't need a state industrial policy to develop alternative energy; the market is taking care of that. Nor should voters be fooled by claims that oil companies are undertaxed in this state. Those other states touted as having oil extraction taxes do not have California's high corporate income taxes. And it doesn't take a Nobel laureate in economics to figure out — contrary to the proposition's wishful thinking — that those extraction taxes will somehow get passed on to consumers.

[calcowgirl]

Once in a while, the LA Times gets it right.

This time, they hit the nail on the head.

[Pacothecat]

Clinton and Gore are on ads 24/7 shilling this prop.They are about to get a not so friendly "Bye don't let the door hit you on the ass on the way out"

[Amerigomag]

Both Clinton and Gore are aberrations. Most understand their character handicaps. Most place little value in their opinions.

If forced to guess, I'd say Clinton's support would doom any tax measure, even one with merit.

[goldstategop]

Its about enlisting the state on your side to squash the competition while you pocket the profits. Not a bad arrangement for venture capitalists.

"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." -Manuel II Paleologus

[Uncle Hal]

Twice a day the stopped clock is right. Notice this editorial comes out on election day when most people have already made up their minds.

[calcowgirl]

I hate to give them credit, but... Among their official endorsements published weeks ago, they recommended a NO vote on Prop 87.

Like you said, even a stopped clock is right twice a day! lol.