Does The Governor’s Transportation Plan Make Any Sense?

Right now one of the hot items being discussed by the Virginia General Assembly is Governor McDonnell’s plan to fund transportation projects. 

The Republican Governor is calling for a hike in the state sales tax by about 0.8 cents.  All of the revenue generated from this increase would in turn go to fund transportation projects to the tune of $3.1 billion.  However motorists would actually get a break as the Governor’s plan also calls for eliminating the state’s tax on gasoline. 

 How does that make any sense?

As a conservative, in my mind, the best kind of tax should be correlated as closely as possible with the government service being used by the individual.  In the case of the gas tax, that’s easy.  If you use the roads, you pay the tax.  The more you use the roads, the more taxes you pay.

That’s how it should be.

Here’s the problem though.  While vehicles have become more fuel efficient over the past few decades, gas taxes have remained relatively flat.  This has led to declining revenues for transportation projects across the country.

If you ask me, the obvious solution is to raise gas taxes accordingly.

But such moves are politically unpopular, especially if you are a Republican like McDonnell. 

So then the solution becomes to raise taxes on everything else, thereby penalizing all of the citizens who either don’t use the roads at all, or use them a lot less by making use of car pools, or public transportation.

Moving from a tax that is closely correlated to individual use of government services to a blatant and indiscriminate tax on everything regardless of how much you use an individual service is simply unfair.

It also goes against conservative principals.  I would urge all of my fellow Virginians to urge the Governor to re-consider the faulty logic of this plan. 

Sequestration Updates

 UPDATE: 01/25: The Washington Times reports that the Pentagon is now beginning the process of laying off around 46,000 from its temporary work force.  This is not a good sign of things to come.


Get ready for an economic meltdown folks.  While Congress may have avoided an overly dramatic economic collapse back in January, the dreaded slow down in federal spending, known as sequestration looks like it is just around the corner.  The day of reckoning for Northern Virginia is closing in fast.  Here are the latest updates.

Politico reports (01/24) that many local area lawmakers are losing confidence that sequestration can be avoided.   Congressman Jim Moran of Alexandria was quoted as saying that, “In the next three months, six months, I think only bad things can happen.”  Gerry Connolly, another democratic congressman from Northern Virginia also weighed in, saying that approximately 8% of Northern Virginia’s economy is directly threatened by sequestration. 

In a similar report, Josh Hicks from the Washington Post reported in his blog that a growing number of congressmen from both sides of the aisle are resigned to the idea that sequestration will begin shortly after the March 1 deadline.  That said, some leaders believe that sequestration will only be temporary and that spending might be restored as part of some sort of grand bargain on the federal budget.

In other coverage today, Federal News radio reports that the Defense Finance and Accounting Service is planning to implement severe cost cutting measures in anticipation of sequestration.  According to a staff email sent from DFAS Director Terri McKay, these cost cutting measures will include a freeze on new hiring. 

Will March 1^st be the start of the end for a peaceful and prosperous Fairfax County?

Are We Ever Going To See Any Snow?

What a sad state of affairs. The Washington DC area has yet to see any significant snow fall since the start of the winter.  Temperatures have hovered in the 40-50 range over the past few weeks, making this an unusually warm January.  To make matters worse, predictions of our first winter snow storm proved to be premature.  Initial predictions for snow were in the range of 2-4 inches.  The current forecast now calls for a “dusting” that is unlikely to actually stick to the ground.  In short, you will be lucky to see so much as a single snow flake this evening.

Unfortunately, this seems to be part of a much larger trend.  Last year was the hottest year on record for the United States.  In addition, if 2013 looks anything like 2012, than this will be the second winter in a row without significant snow fall or cold weather.  Could global climate change be to blame for these whether events? It certainly seems to look that way.  Of course some studies have also indicated that global climate change could make winters more severe, making events like the “Snowmageddon” of 2010 more likely. 

Either way, for a lot of Fairfax residents, it seems like an eternity since the last time the area experienced anything close to a "normal" winter.

General Assembly Hard At Work

It seems like every year, state legislators work very hard to pass more laws, criminalizing and regulating even more behavior than the previous year.  Indeed, wouldn’t it make sense for us to ask our legislators how many bad laws they managed to repeal this session? Unfortunately, that is not how our political system works.

All that being said, some laws are simply honest attempts to fix other laws that have proven ineffective or have had unintended consequences for the public after they were enacted.
Since the actions of the General Assembly will undoubtedly affect our lives here in Fairfax County, here is a small list of some of the more interesting laws being considered this session.

SB 786, introduced by Democratic Sen. Dave Marsden of Burke, would impose a $250 civil fine for failing to report to law enforcement that a firearm he or she lawfully possesses is lost or stolen.

Another gun law to watch for is SB911, which was introduced by Sen. Janet Howell of Reston. This proposed law would require criminal background checks for any firearms sold at gun show events, even ones that are sold by a non-licensed vendor outside the ordinary course of business.
These look like the token gun control legislation that Democrats try to push through every year.  While its outlook remains doubtful, the Newtown shooting event may make measures like these more attractive in the public eye. 

Meanwhile HB1357 introduced by Tom Rust of Herndon would make texting while driving a primary offense.  Currently, the secondary nature of this offense means that the police cannot pull you over if they see you texting in your vehicle.  However, if they pull you over for speeding, they can charge you with the additional offense of texting.  With the new law, the Police will be able to make a traffic stop and fine you for texting if they see it while patrolling around. 

Fairfax Spared Wrath Of Sequestration

Thanks to the fiscal cliff compromise it looks like Fairfax has temporarily been spared the full wrath of  defense spending cuts known as sequestration.

Some sources were reporting yesterday that as many as 800,000 federal contractors would have received layoff notices as early as Wednesday if the sequester had gone into effect.  The local region in turn could have lost as many as 100,000 jobs.  This in turn could have easily turned into an economic disaster for the local area as the resulting job losses would have spilled over into the broader economy. 

Unfortunately, we are not out of the woods yet. Congress only delayed the cuts by two months.  Republicans are hoping to use the sequester as leverage in another debt ceiling deal with President Obama. 

The fiscal cliff deal also saw tax rates rise, and not just for wealthy Americans either.

WTOP published an article that breaks down expected tax increases for 2013 based on income level. 

Unfortunately, every income level will see their tax levels increase at the start of the new year. 

So at the start of the new year, we are all facing higher taxes and potentially massive layoffs in the months to come.

Happy 2013 indeed!