BLANCO TO BUSH: SCREW YOU
Gov. Kathleen Blanco warned this week that the state would not support future
offshore lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico unless Louisiana gets a share of
the federal royalties generated by oil production there. You can read more
here
At last Blanco is showing some spine. I'm sick of begging Washington.
Bush says the country is "addicted" to oil. It's time to make these addicts pay.
10 comments:
You can't possibly be serious. How do you think we ended up with only 50% of the royalties within 3 miles, and nothing beyond in the first place? It was old Louisiana politicians who thought they could push around the federal governemnt. As much as the Republican party and the current administration like to say they are for state's rights this is a country that is run from Washington and it's probably for the best that it is. We couldn't even stand up to the federal government to keep our drinking age at 18 rather than 21 for crying out loud! They'll just start pulling federal funds for any subsidized projects, including Medicare, highways, public safety, you name it. It's a loser's bluff that is set up to give her a good possible showing, but it would never happen.
I am serious and so is Blanco. She gets underestimated but I think she's ready to act.
How can you possibly say the country is better off run from Washington? When it reaches the point where your home is flooded becasue of Federal incompetence you have to take a stand.
evacuee
I still challenge you: prove your previous contention that Louisiana taxes corporations more than other states.
I don't think that's correct but if you can back it up with evidence I'm a reasonable person.
I repeat my earlier opening, but you can't possibly be serious. Just take a look at the following:
We tax corporations on their debt, which is used to grow the business at a quicker rate than possible without debt (leverage is the term). This tax curbs development and makes projects look far worse financially than they would otherwise.
We also levy a "franchise tax" on businesses that taxes capital employed in a business enterprise in Louisiana. How does this encourage businesses to build multimillion dollar plants to build or process anything here? That's right, it doesn't. It's the biggest reason that we haven't been seriously involved in any of the discussions about the auto plants that so many of our neighboring states have lured in recent years.
Combine this with high income and property taxes for corporate entities and you have an extremely unfavorable environment for business.
Page 2 of this link shows a comparison of LA corporate tax burdens compared to other southern states. To quote the paper:
If a conclusion can be drawn from the cluster-firm data, it might be that Louisiana’s basic tax structure is not well suited, in the long run, to some of the targeted industries.
http://www.la-par.org/Publications/PDF/corptax.pdf
"If a conclusion can be drawn from the cluster-firm data, it might be that Louisiana’s basic tax structure is not well suited, in the long run, to some of the targeted industries."
That's not exactly a statement that Louisiana is significantly worse than some of these other states, who basically don't have much. We have oil & gas and chemical plants, etc.
Do you seriously believe that nay refinery would close up shop in Louisiana if we slapped a dollar a barrel tax?
in reference to Blanco, she's not even proposing a tax that would cost industry; she's claiming ag reater share of the Federal royalty.
Your argument there is that the Feds would punish us. I don't think so. Becaue we aren't going to have the same yahoos in Washington in 2 years that are ruining things now.
So let me get this right. Your argument is that the most vindictive, vicious, renegade administration we have seen in years won't go after people that are calling them out in public?
You're even more wrong about that than you are about the tax structure of Louisiana.
I think La.'s position is analogous to a public sector union in a collective bargaining dispute: strength of position is important, but public opinion is the most important thing. La. needs to press for the same treatment as other Oil&Gas producing states, that'll play well. If we try to place a new tax we'll end up like PANO trying to strike during Mardi Gras.
evacuee
We agree on the vicious nature of the administration in Washington.
But I don't think it will play out as you imagine.
In any case, what exactly is teh alternative.
The headline is already clear
BUSH TO NEW ORLEANS: DROP DEAD
So we have to do something for ourselves.
bayoust.john
Whatever works is fine with me.
The state has the right to place a refinery tax if we chose.
If we can get a better share of the offshore royalty that's fine too.
Maybe we need to threaten the first to get teh second.
I just think we have to act, and stop passing the begging bowl around Washington.
Here's my thought: if Louisiana flips Democratic in the next presidential election, we could help elect a friendlier president.
Evacuee,
I think the problem is that we haven't had leadership in this state strong enough to stand up to Washington and demand what we deserve. 18% of this country's energy supply runs through Port Fourchon alone. If we shut it down, gas prices would immediately jump about $2/gallon....This is no bluff, bro...we're sitting on a Royal Flush and for the first time we've got someone with balls enough to play the hand. And don't forget...we've got the access point to the Mississippi. So unless the country want's to spend 3 trillion dollars re-routing the River through another state....we have some serious cards to play against them. She's doing the right thing....the Washington power structure doesn't respect begging...but they do understand getting punked, which is what she's doing. Thank God someone finally has the balls to do it.
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