Just look at the invasions of liberty under consideration in Montpelier. The House, on a vote of 133-7, has just passed a bill forbidding Vermonters from buying appliances that the State finds to be insufficiently energy efficient.
Let the governor take credit for this: For the second consecutive year he has proposed a budget that does not raise a single tax or fee, and his proposed General Fund spending exceeds this year’s by only $82 million.
Sen. Claire Ayer and Rep. William Lippert do not want young healthy to drop their insurance. They are seriously considering shutting off this exit ramp for the young and healthy by creating a Vermont individual mandate to buy state-approved insurance.
The biennial session of the Legislature that convenes this week will face more than its share of hot button issues. Here’s a quick survey of the 2018 agenda.
VPIRG will never give up trying to get legislative majorities to tax, mandate, prohibit, spend, regulate and penalize the people of this state until its every imaginable goal is achieved — and that imagination has no limit.
On Dec. 18 Gov. Phil Scott will convene an education summit to address “the crisis of affordability and how it impacts the opportunities we are able to provide our children.”
Nuclear stations deliver steady, safe, reliable dispatchable baseload power to the grid, accompanied by almost no greenhouse gas emissions.
Even though the Soviet Empire is gone for a quarter century, the evil of Marxist-Leninist ideology, and its less vicious offspring “democratic socialism,” are still with us.
We are, alas, well into the era of bitter partisan conflict with high stakes, improbable revenue projections, irreducible federal spending and steadily growing national debt. The current bill will make large and worthwhile changes in the tax code, but falls short of restoring a bright fiscal future.
Too much intermittent renewable power causes increasing problems of grid management, as is the case from Vermont to Australia.
The ultimate goal of this “regulation and taxation through litigation” is to force selected industries to the wall.
If the higher price of solar panels and the declining Investment Tax Credit undercut the viability of their business plans, expect an urgent appeal for a taxpayer bailout for solar installers, to counter the government tariff bailout of the solar panel makers.