Letters Oct. 27

Cleaner future path

Milton Friedman, an economist and conservative icon, asserted years ago, “If you have a pollution problem, don’t regulate it, tax it.” Most economists now agree. Raising the price of something we don’t want, like pollution, is the best way to encourage consumers to switch to less-polluting choices and to reward innovation and investment in cleaner alternatives.

Voters in Washington have a unique opportunity to embrace this market-based approach for mitigating risks from climate change and providing our children a brighter future.

Initiative 732 is tax reform. It places a tax on carbon pollution from fossil fuels, so they more accurately reflect their true cost to society, and returns those revenues to Washingtonians by lowering other taxes. I-732 reduces pollution and improves health without growing government.

Here is what you should know about I-732.

1. It reduces Washington’s sales tax by one percentage point; you’ll save $1 on each $100 non-food purchase.

2. It essentially eliminates the business and occupation tax, which has been an impediment to job creation.

3. It funds the Working Families Rebate, helping 400,000 low-income households. This is not welfare but how 25 other states have made their tax systems fairer while reducing poverty, particularly among families with children.

4. It creates a $25 per ton emissions tax on CO2 (about 22 cents per gallon of gasoline). It rises gradually over 40 years with small annual increases, remaining below a penny per gallon (in real dollars) for the first seven years.

5. To protect the competitiveness of our export-dependent farmers, it largely exempts agricultural energy uses.

6. “I-732 is revenue neutral, to the best of anyone’s ability to forecast it,” according to the independent Sightline Institute. A flawed analysis by Washington’s Office of Financial Management, which projected a tax revenue reduction, contained several errors.

7. I-732 will provide a nonpartisan model for other states to follow, even if our federal government remains log-jammed by special interests and partisan bickering.

None of us would skip out on our bill at a restaurant. Let’s similarly hold ourselves accountable for the cost of using energy, rather than leave the tab for our kids and grandkids. I-732 will clean the air, improve health, spur job creation, and move us toward energy independence, while mitigating risks associated with CO2 emissions.

Even The Wall Street Journal says that I-732 “ought to be a slam dunk” for passage. Vote yes on I-732.

Rob Briggs, Pullman

One small step

This is a belated response to Gordon Forgey’s prescient editorial of April 3, 2014: Thank you!

The editorial discusses “a carbon tax to save the world” proposed by Citizens’ Climate Lobby of the Palouse. It describes CCL’s intent “to cut carbon emissions by putting a tax on them.” That vision could come to fruition next week, as Washington voters decide on Initiative 732.

Briefly, I-732 is designed to tax carbon emissions on certain fossil fuels, reduce our regressive sales tax by one percent, provide tax relief for qualifying low-income households, and reduce business and occupation taxes by a small amount.

It is projected to be revenue neutral. More importantly, if passed, it will put our state in the forefront of dealing with climate change. We will be the first, a model for the other 49 states.

Much of the thinking that went into I-732 was based on what British Columbia has been doing since 2008. Alberta will inaugurate a similar approach in January 2017, and other provinces already have variations on that theme. In fact, BC’s carbon tax has been so successful that Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is proposing a similar tax nationwide.

So, what’s the problem?

The problem seems to be that I-732 is not perfect. Some environmental groups in Washington oppose it, primarily because it doesn’t match their agendas. Perhaps they’ve not heard of throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

In one sense, they’re correct: I-732 isn’t perfect. But it’s a major start, not only in dealing with carbon emissions, but also in changing thinking about the whole issue of climate change and what to do about it.

Forgey’s editorial recognizes the “anticipated consequences of climate change” and observes “the world is at serious risk.” Two-and-a-half years later, what’s been done here? Nothing, in Washington state; yet, the world continues to warm, and the climate continues to change.

From my perspective, “serious risk” doesn’t cut it. The predicament confronting humankind is not well understood, but certain trends are clear. In my 80-year lifetime, world population has increased from about 2 billion to 7.4 billion. It is still expanding exponentially worldwide, even though growth is slowing in some regions.

Each of those individuals consumes goods and services requiring energy, energy produced primarily by fossil fuels. Although renewable energy sources are growing rapidly, many concerned observers believe these alternatives may be too little, too late.

An article on NPR this month by astrophysicist Dr. Adam Frank encapsulates the enormity of the problem, stating: “But the part of climate change we’ve failed to culturally metabolize is the meaning of what’s happening to us and the planet.”

“What we don’t get,” he continues, “is the true planetary context of the planetary transformation human civilization is driving.” Frank goes on to describe how scientists “now recognize that our impact on Earth has become so significant we’ve pushed it out of the Holocene into the Anthropocene, an entirely new geological epoch.”

In a conclusion reminiscent of the “Gaia hypothesis” proposed in 1973, Frank suggests that we might yet make it if we develop “the maturity to ‘think like a planet’ or the planet will just move on without us.”

Most of us have families and other loved ones, many younger than we. What kind of a future faces them and their descendants? The answer is, we don’t know. We can’t know the future.

But we can use our God-given intelligence to develop some educated guesses, and the educated guesses I’ve seen do not bode well.

Part of the reason we can’t agree appears to be the loss of trust in our society. To whom can we turn in times of crisis? Who can we believe? Our government, our politicians, our scientists, our clergy, our local bartenders and so forth?

These are issues each of us faces in both short and long term. The zero-sum, winner-take-all mentality permeating our nation and elsewhere militate against unified solutions. Can we overcome them in time?

One small step in starting to solve the problems will be a “Yes” vote on I-732.

Pete Haug,

Colfax

Not my vote

Unfortunately, Cathy McMorris Rodger’s political ambition has left behind any moral principles. My party and Cathy McMorris Rodgers have crossed the line supporting Donald Trump and have abandoned not only standards of decency, but true conservatism.

I’m not sure who to vote for, but it won’t be Trump or Rodgers.

Tanner Morgan, Walla Walla

Contrary answers

Mary Dye, a candidate for Washington House of Representatives from District 9, said back in September that the Islamic Center in Pullman was “one of the most dangerous mosques in America.’’ She was asked at the League of Women Voters forum in Pullman Oct. 20th two questions related to her statement.

One was what her thoughts were on the Muslim mosque in Pullman, and the other asked how she plans to represent various groups in her district.

She answered the first saying that she felt that the freedom of religion applied to all religions and that she respects everyone’s right to express and practice their religion and culture.

She answered the second by saying that everyone is different and that she didn’t believe in identity politics dividing people into different groups.

(I do not have the exact quote of the questions or answers.

You can see for yourself in the video of the forum at lwvpullman.org/forums.

html.) Her answers seems contrary to her previous statement and do not acknowledge, let alone apologize for it.

Either she has dementia or lies. Either way, I don’t think we want someone with dementia or who lies to represent us in Olympia.

Charlotte Omoto, Palouse