Among the issues most commonly discussed are individuality, the rights of the individual, the limits of legitimate government, morality, history, economics, government policy, science, business, education, health care, energy, and man-made global warming evaluations. My posts are aimed at intelligent and rational individuals, whose comments are very welcome.

"No matter how vast your knowledge or how modest, it is your own mind that has to acquire it." Ayn Rand

"Observe that the 'haves' are those who have freedom, and that it is freedom that the 'have-nots' have not." Ayn Rand

"The virtue involved in helping those one loves is not 'selflessness' or 'sacrifice', but integrity." Ayn Rand

For "a human being, the question 'to be or not to be,' is the question 'to think or not to think.'" Ayn Rand

31 December 2009

The French Carbon Tax Bill is Found Unconstitutional

The new French carbon tax was scheduled to go into law on 1 January 2010. The tax was 17 euros per ton of carbon dioxide (USD $24.40). In France, if at least 60 Deputies of the House and 60 Senators appeal to the Constitutional Council, it has the power to determine the constitutionality of a proposed law.  The 2010 national budget of France, which contained enabling provisions for a carbon tax has been ruled unconstitutional on two grounds:
  • The exemptions contained within the provisions for a carbon levy vitiated the primary declared purpose of the levy, to combat carbon emissions and hence “global warming”
  • The exemptions would cause the levy to fall disproportionately on gasoline and heating oils and not on other carbon emissions, thereby breaching the principle that taxation should be evenly and fairly borne.
This ruling has come as quite a shock to the catastrophic anthropogenic global warming alarmists.

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