In one of the most destructive votes of this General Assembly session, the State Senate yesterday passed, by an 18-16 vote, a measure to tax energy used for industry.  Ironically, the Denver Post notes that one of the biggest victims of the tax, a steel mill in Pueblo which has said it will have to lay off as many as 120 workers because of the tax, was the prior employer of a Democratic State Senator, Abel Tapia, who was laid off from the same mill 20 years ago and voted for the job-killing bill.

The bill, HB10-1190, sponsored by two of the most leftist members of the General Assembly as were almost all of the “Dirty Dozen” Democratic tax hikes, was, in my view, actually a jobs bill.  The problem is that it’s a jobs bill for other states.  Let’s call it “Jobs for Utah.”

The bill, which actually removes an existing exemption from “state sales and use taxes for the storage, use, or consumption of electricity, coal, coke, fuel oil, steam, nuclear fuel, or gas for use in processing, manufacturing, mining, refining, irrigation, building construction, telegraph, telephone, and radio communication, street and railroad transportation services, and all industrial uses…”

But removing an exemption is no different in impact than adding a tax.  And when you increase taxes at such an early stage of production, not only do you kill industrial jobs in the state (indeed, what sorts of jobs if not industrial jobs to Democrats routinely mourn the loss of?), but you also increase the cost of everything manufactured in the state.

Senate Minority Leader Josh Penry attempted to make this point to State Senator John Morse (a rare and hopefully soon extinct Colorado Springs Democrat) by presenting him with a copy of Milton Friedman’s Free to Choose and explaining again that raising taxes during a recession is economically insane.

What will be particularly interesting to watch is how the Democrats spend this money they’re stealing from taxpayers.  If they had spent the extra money taken in from Referendum C in a responsible way, including a rainy day fund, if they had spent it as supporters of Ref C said it would be spent, the state’s budget issues would not be as large as they are today.

Democrats routinely claim that teachers will lose their jobs if taxes aren’t raised.  Teachers are, after all, the sacred cows in our political system.  In a press release, Senate Republicans argue that the threat to teachers is simply a myth.  While I am not in the habit of quoting press releases, this issue is important enough and well-enough explained in the release that I’ll quote it almost in its entirety:

Senate Republicans saw through the guise and are calling on their Democrat counterparts to knock off the false rhetoric.   “Democrats know full well that K-12 education won’t see an extra dime from these tax increases,” said Sen. Nancy Spence, R-Centennial.  “It’s time for the Democrats to stop lying to the public about where this money will go.”

Democrats even went as far as to evoke the falsehood in a fundraising e-mail.  Increasing taxes “means $145 million we do not have to cut from K-12 education,” the Democrat fundraising e-mail said, specifically claiming that one tax could save up to 1,700 jobs for teachers.

Senate Minority Leader Josh Penry, R-Grand Junction, even offered multiple amendments during the tax debate that would have allocated 40 percent or more of the money to K-12 education funding.  Democrats overwhelmingly defeated Penry’s amendments.

Yet Democrats have not given up perpetuating the fairy tale notion that the tax increases will save K-12 education from cuts.  Sen. Pat Steadman, D-Denver, asserted just today that this package of tax increases is “necessary to prevent deeper cuts” to K-12 education.

“All we’re asking the Democrats for is truth in advertising,” Penry said.  “For goodness sake, don’t say this is for the kids and teachers when your votes prove all you want is another slush fund of cash.”

Democrats also mislead the public about their intentions behind a 2007 property tax increase, saying at the time the money would go to schools.  Democrat Gov. Bill Ritter even touted the measure as the “Colorado Children’s Amendment.” However, none of the money was set aside for K-12 education.  As such, no discernible increase in K-12 funding from the property tax increase can be seen.

Democrats are charging full-speed ahead with tax hikes that will raise less money than they expect while angering large numbers of Coloradoans.  With the Obama Administration and Democrats in DC taking the same approach, we’re seeing the actions of both state and federal Democratic governments reinforce the view in voters’ minds that Democrats are utterly and irredeemably fiscally irresponsible.

It takes a hell of a lot of big spending and being out-of-touch with voters to make people forget just how bad Republicans were (at the federal level; Colorado’s GOP politicians have been much better) during much of the past decade.  For Democrats to make people think of George W. Bush and the Congresses he served alongside as relatively responsible, and to do so in just one year, is a remarkable achievement.

I’ve said many times that Republicans can’t sit by and just wait for people to vote against Democrats.  The GOP has to give voters something to vote for. Luckily, we are seeing that at the state level and to a lesser but still important degree in DC.  In Denver, Senate Republicans proposed a modest across-the-board cut in state government salary spending which would eliminate the need for every one of the “Dirty Dozen” tax hikes.  In DC, Congressman Paul Ryan’s “Roadmap", while not a new plan, is finally getting enough attention in the “mainstream” media to make it extremely difficult for Obama/Reid/Pelosi to claim that the Republicans are not offering alternative plans.  While Democrats live in their Progressive (aka socialist) echo chamber, the GOP really does seem to be offering people something to vote for.

It’s about time, but better late than never.