Van Doren and Taylor for Congress

I wish the Cato Institute's Peter Van Doren and Jerry Taylor were members of Congress. They would give their constiuents some great advice.

[Congressman] Kingston's second rationale for the bill was the now-predictable observation that prices are high and government must act. Toward that end, he recalled a constituent who recently complained that he was driving 75 miles each way to work in a Ford F-150 and that gasoline prices were absolutely killing him. The government, Kingston intoned, simply had to do something.

A good rule of thumb is that the feds shouldn't do something for you that you can easily do for yourself. What Kingston should have told his constituent is this: "If you don't like high gasoline prices, then you might want to think about selling the F-150 and/or moving closer to work. That would do more to cut your costs than anything I can do."

Awesome. I'm so sick of people thinking cheap gas is some sort of right. Take the fuckin' bus already. Or walk. Of course, personal responsibility is too much to ask for these days. That's why all the rural Red State rednecks want government gasoline welfare checks.