Death (blessed relief!) and Taxes

Last night as I walked in the house, my daughter was watching President Clinton shilling for a proposed tax on "energy company" profits here in California. We watched Mr. ex-President explain all the glowing things this tax was going to do for us, including freeing us from the need for foreign oil, and my smart daughter asked if I was going to vote for this proposition. Hmmm.

Aside from being a great teaching opportunity, and from being proud that my 10-year-old actually took an interest in something in the world other than dolls or video games, it was a great opportunity to review whether this proposition was worthwhile or not. I'm not opposed to whacking the cretins that run the "energy" companies in the USA, hoarding billions of dollars of assets that should be returned to the people somehow, but does this proposition actually do any of that?

This happened just before dinner, so I only had a few minutes to explain to Bailey why I think this proposition, like every other tax proposition on the crowded California ballot, is a bad idea. We got out the voter information bulletin we received in the mail a week ago and I showed her the page where the pros and cons of this proposition were outlined in gory detail. She didn't understand a few of the words, so it was a vocabulary building lesson as well. When we got done, she was unable to make up her mind, and understood the process of getting both sides of the story a little better.

So how do I feel about Prop 87, and Prop 86, the "Tax the Smokers 'til they Quit" tax, and the other taxes on the ballot? Fine, so long as they don't establish yet another state beauracry full of handle-hangers or give my hard-earned dollars away to yet another special interest. Guess what? Both of these propositions are full of corporate hand-outs, new state offices of wasting tax dollars, and questionable grant funds with no performance targets.

No thanks.