On The Other Hand

Avent is beginning to lose faith in the political process:

Honestly, I’ve just about given up on the idea that an increase in the gas tax is possible. The Gulf of Mexico is filling up with oil, and no one in Washington is even mumbling under his or her breath that maybe now is a good time to think about an increase. But this is the easy answer policy-wise if not politically. You tax gas, you reduce consumption, and you raise the money to once-again provide the country with a first-class transportation system.

Obama has made some gestures in this direction, but in my view, he should do much more. The way to seize this moment is not to attempt to control what you cannot - the gush of oil from the open wound in the floor of the Gulf. It is to remind people of the lax regulation that allowed this to happen - this is Bush-Cheney's second Katrina - and to make the case more passionately than ever that we need a strategy to get off our oil addiction.

In the end, BP is merely the pusher. We are the addicts. If this isn't hitting bottom, what is?