Baby Steps in British Columbia
Over the past few weeks I've been ruminating more and more about how I would like to live in another country, one of those socialist ones, where I would have health care paid for (this longing largely sprung out of a struggle to pay for wisdom teeth extraction -- even with health insurance!!), and things like this would happen:
Voters in British Columbia have reelected Gordon Campbell, who promotes carbon tax, as premier of the province. Campbell specifically noted that his election is a vote of support for the carbon tax policy.
Now, why can't we do that in this country? What drives me crazy about the debate over climate change (and health care for that matter), is that somehow supporters of carbon tax (or single payer health care) are made to feel like crazy extreme leftists (or - gasp! - socialists).
How did affairs progress to this state? Can the U.S. begin to behave a bit more like Canada? Or do I need to face the fact that I'm just too progressive for this country and move? Somehow I think, for the good of everyone, that the former should happen.
Voters in British Columbia have reelected Gordon Campbell, who promotes carbon tax, as premier of the province. Campbell specifically noted that his election is a vote of support for the carbon tax policy.
Now, why can't we do that in this country? What drives me crazy about the debate over climate change (and health care for that matter), is that somehow supporters of carbon tax (or single payer health care) are made to feel like crazy extreme leftists (or - gasp! - socialists).
How did affairs progress to this state? Can the U.S. begin to behave a bit more like Canada? Or do I need to face the fact that I'm just too progressive for this country and move? Somehow I think, for the good of everyone, that the former should happen.
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Labels: cap and trade, climate change, environment
posted by Caroline at
11:12 AM
1 Comments:
No need to split to Canada. Just move to Massachusetts, where we continue to debate a high gas tax. Sure, people here aren't jumping at tax increases, but when we put it to a vote in 2008, 70% of Bay Staters wanted to keep the income tax. Most times such a proposition is put to voters, throughout the US, actually, they tend to vote to keep taxes or raise them if they know what it's for. (Suburban Denver voted for a sales tax increase to fund commuter rail, etc.)
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