Feb
20
Bob Vander Plaats
Already the 2010 gubernatorial campaign in Iowa is heating up. Chet Culver, the Democratic incumbent, is up against Republicans Bob Vander Plaats and Bill Northey (along with several other potential candidates).
It seems we already have a defining issue for the campaigns – the proposed Gas Tax increase. Both Vander Plaats and Culver oppose the idea, while a few other Republicans support it. The increase is designed to ease the financial shortcomings of the state. The current legislature does not want to erase any existing services, but income has dropped. “Where to get the money?” they asked.
How can this be considered acceptable? If I, as an individual citizen, lost a portion of my income would it be deemed appropriate to demand that my lifestyle not be affected? No, I would be expected to cut my expenses – I couldn’t just require others to give me more money.
Iowa needs to realize the need to cut expenses. Over the past few years this state’s government has increased under Chet Culver’s leadership. It is time to scale back and remove the unused, poorly implemented, or ineffective programs that are dragging us into debt. Rather than grab more money from the citizens to make up for poor planning Iowa needs to find a way to do with what it currently has.
Will it be hard? Probably. But no one should be forced to make up for someone’s errors – especially when that someone is the government.
| Against Tax Increase Chet Culver (Dem. Governor) Bob Vander Plaats (Rep. candidate) |
For Tax Increase Bill Northey (Rep. candidate) |
Your Thoughts, Please!
Please let me know what you think! Write your thoughts, opinions, or points in this articles Comments. I appreciate everyone’s responses!
I agree! I think the same sort of concept could be and should be applied to the all of the corporate/bank bailouts….simply because we are in a recessionary period, people are asking the government to bail them out, whereas if things were going well, they would just have to file bankruptcy and figure out how to run their business (be it a bank, an automaker, etc) more efficiently! Anyway, good little article!
What we need and what we’ll do are completely different. So while we’re trying to cut back and weed out the “unused, poorly implemented, or ineffective programs that are dragging us into debt”, – a 4cent tax increase at the pumps is not going to be detrimental to anyone’s wallet. Push the Gas Tax and fix the roads and bridges already.