Thank you Brian Moran!
STATEMENT ON GOP ABUSIVE DRIVER TAX REVISIONS~end it, don't mend it~
House Democratic Caucus Chairman Brian J. Moran made the following statement in response to today's GOP Abusive Driver Tax revision proposal. Delegate Moran has consistently opposed stand-alone version of the abusive driver fees in the House Transportation committee and on the floor of the House. He is the author of Virginia's felony DUI law and a former long-time prosecutor.
"Over two-hundred thousand Virginians have called on the Republican leadership to change course and eliminate these ill-conceived fees - yet today they failed to do so. It's clear from other states that these fees cost taxpayers more then they generate.
Today's GOP proposals falls far short of fixing this flawed policy, it merely puts a band aid on problem. The Republican proposals continues to unfairly tax Virginians, drive many middle class residents in cycles of debt, and force our cops to be tax collectors. It's not time to mend these fees, it's time to end them."
I couldn't agree more. These things have got to go.
Whack-jobs on the far-right are calling for the repeal of these fees because they're taxes, and normal, intelligent people are calling for their repeal because they're a sad excuse for taxes (law school day one: don't use criminal law to raise revenue).
The moral of the story is: anti-tax Republicans never win.
Once again we hear Republicans sticking with the plan to turn our police officers into tax collectors, which is no way to solve the transportation crisis that northern Virginians face everyday. Ken Cuccinelli has repeatedly bragged in his own literature about his `decisive vote' that enacted these fees in the first place, and without his vote women in labor would not be funding urgently needed road improvements.