Just What the Country Needs, a "Reasonable Profits Board"

It just what the country needs, a "Reasonable Profits Board". So says Congressman Dennis Kucinich. The board would be made up of three members appointed by the president and it would impose a tax on oil companies that earned above a "reasonable profit" by apply a windfall profits tax to range from 50 to 100 percent of earnings beyond what the board deems a reasonable profit. Why do Rep. Kucinich and the cosponsors think gasoline prices may rise. Primarily because the administration has done everything in its power to drive up energy prices. It has allowed the Iranian government to maintain a credible threat to shut off one quarter of the world's oil supply by blockading shipping in the Persian Gulf. It has refused to allow the construction of the Keystone XL pipe line for reasons at odd with its original environmental evaluation and it has brought oil and gas drilling on federal lands to a near 20 year low. Under the Kucinich plan, The Gas Price Spike Act, H.R. 3784 money raised from the windfall profits would be funneled into more useless green transportation projects such as high speed rail and subsidies in the form of rebates to people who buy cars the normally would not want. Fortunately Congress is in the hands of saner people so this bill is going nowhere but to cynically drive up gas prices to extract higher taxes is a new wrinkle we haven't seen before. Joining Kucinich in this lunacy as cosponsors are; Reps. John Conyers Jr. (Mich.), Bob Filner (Calif.), Marcia Fudge (Ohio), Jim Langevin (R.I.), and Lynn Woolsey (Calif.).