Walker, Green come to Jesus on gas tax

Meet the Republican candidates for governor, Mr. Flip and Mr. Flop. But change is a good thing, they say -- they have seen the light, not on the road to Damascus but on the campaign trail for governor.

They've been dueling all week about which one hates gasoline taxes more than than the other. Scott Walker presses for a vote to end the automatic gas tax increase every April. Mark Green calls that and raises Walker by proposing a 2-cent cut in the gas tax, too.

It turns out that both Green and Walker are recent converts who have been born again on this issue. They've gotten religion after sinning against conservative doctrine in their past lives, as Wisconsin state legislators.

As Spivak and Bice report today, both Green and Walker had a chance, in the legislature, to vote to end the gas tax indexing, which automatically raises the gas tax every year without lawmakers having to vote for it.

It's a great system if you're a legislator who doesn't want to have to vote to raise taxes. It's not so great if you're a taxpayer. Wisconsin's gasoline tax has gone up 21 times since 1985, while the federal gasoline tax of 18.4 cents a gallon hasn't been raised since 1993. What's the difference? To raise the federal gas tax, it requires a vote of the Congress and approval by the President.

Both Green and Walker voted in the State Assembly to continue the automatic indexing system.
And both also voted for a state budget that actually raised the gas tax in addition to continuing the index.

I had mentioned Walker's sordid past in an earlier post, but didn't realize Green was just as big a sinner.

Walker's response was classic -- Hey, nobody's perfect. (Actual quote: "I haven't said that anyone in the governor's race is absolutely perfect on it.")

Granted. But when you go around attacking other Republicans on the issue, for not doing enough or not moving quickly enough, you do leave yourself open to some pushback. Some right-wingers are suggesting John Gard is a RINO (Republican in Name Only) for putting up some resistance on repeal of the indexing. But the same people champion Walker and (to a lesser extent, Green), whose credentials are no better than Gard's.

Besides the two votes mentioned by Spivak and Bice, Walker passed on a couple of other chances to try to repeal the gas tax indexing, too.

Green was in Congress by the time these two came around. The first, 2001 AB344, was introduced by Rep. Peter Bock. Walker passed on the opportunity to co-sponsor the bill. Walker did offer an amendment, to remove $90.3 million from the transportation budget (the money generated from indexing in 2001-2003). But that seems more like it was intended to demonstrate the fiscal consequences, and perhaps torpedo the bill. The bill died with no action.

The other bill Walker refused to cosponsor was 1999 AB935, introduced by Rep. Spencer Black, to repeal the gas tax indexing. It also died with no action.