Martin O'Malley Hates People Who Use Gas

Actually, that's not a fair statement. It would be more appropriate to say that Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley LOVES people who use gas. He loves them so much that he thinks they would be a good source of new tax revenue to replenish the State Transportation fund that he raided in order to balance the budget.

You cannot entirely lay the blame on Martin O'Malley for not-so-clandestinely moving money out of the transportation fund to fill his budget of massive increased spending. Former Maryland Governor Bob Ehrlich did the same thing. I'm sure Glendening, Schaefer, Hughes, Mandel, and Agnew all did it, as well.

After being rebuked on his proposal to increase the state sales tax again, this time by nearly 17%, Martin "Ain't A Tax I Don't Like" O'Malley decided he had to find other places to generate revenue to cover his spending increases. What better place to get it than the hard working middle class families of Maryland?

There are now proposals from the media and the blogsphere that if O'Malley is going to apply the state sales tax to gasoline, then the monies generated should be allocated to the Maryland State Transportation fund and should be inaccessible by any future Governor for any use other than transportation projects. Too often the money is used to fill the gaps in other areas. Transportation money should not be spent on funding abortion clinics. Transportation money should not be spent on building stadiums. Transportation money should not be spent on wind farm projects. Transportation money should not be spent on providing services to any Governor's girlfriend who is half his age.

Will the Maryland legislature and the Governor add this common-sense provision, a provision that would overwhelmingly be supported by the vast majority of tax payers of Maryland? Sadly, you know in your heart this will not happen. O'Malley will claim that the state needs to maintain flexibility in tough years to help balance the budget, invest in our future, and keep Maryland moving forward. You know the hollow rhetoric.

Unfortunately, the people that put him in office use gas and will be punished by his spending addiction.

O'Malley Wants You to Pay 64% More In Gas Taxes

Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley, never one to shy away from more taxes, is reviewing a menu of taxes increases proposed by his own "Blue Ribbon" commission to close the state's structural deficit that he created. The tax increases include a nearly 64% increase in the gas tax (raising it from 23.5 cents per gallon to 38.5 cents gallon), increasing car registration fees by 50%, and bus and rail fee increases.

Why so many surprising new taxes? Ha-ha. These aren't surprising. Every logical thinking person knew that if O'Malley got elected he would ratchet-up state spending and raid the Transportation Fund to pay for it (because he could do that). He would then go back to the voters whining and crying how we have no money to fix bridges and roads, but if we could all do our fair share and accept massive tax increases, then our investments would be worth it.

I don't know about you, but I'm tired of our elected officials raiding the Transportation Fund to pay for their pet projects. Republican Bob Ehrlich did it. I believe former Governor and New York-born Paris "My Wife is My Son's Age" Glendening did it. Martin O'Malley certainly has done it.

These tax proposals, which are all but sure to be passed by the short-sighted Maryland General Assembly, would raise an estimated $870 million annually, that is until they raise the taxes even more. And that's not all that unrealistic. The state wants to spend another $12 BILLION on more transportation projects. I don't think this includes replacing bridges and paving roads. This is additional spending: Purple Line in D.C. suburbs, the Red Line in Baltimore, etc...

And what's with this "Blue Ribbon" designation? Just throw some fancy adjectives in front of your commissions' name and make it sound more important? If you appoint the members, aren't they pretty much going to do what you tell them to do? "I appointed a Blue Ribbon Commission to determine who the most awesome political blogger is. Much to my surprised, they picked me!" "I appointed a Blue Ribbon commission to evaluate state spending and what to do about funding the depleted Transportation Fund and they recommended massive regressive tax increases that will hurt lower and middle income families the most."

So how many more years of O'Malley? How many more taxes can he raise? If you're keeping track, he's raised the sales tax by 20%, he pushed for massive fee increases to use the state's bridges and tunnels, a 50% increase in the alcohol tax, the cigarette tax increase, a 50% increase in many of the fishing and hunting license fees (which O'Malley said was a modest increase). The funny thing about the increase in fishing license fees is that after the state increased the fee, fewer fisherman applied for the annual license and the state actually took in LESS revenue.

So here we go again. More taxes. More O'Malley. There's many more things he could tax, I guess. So I guess I better stop complaining. I will go pump up the tires in my bike now.