How is this a bad idea? Let me count the ways:

Lawmakers jockey to offer relief from gas prices - MarketWatch

Senate Republicans sought to steal the show Thursday, unveiling a plan that would give taxpayers a $100 gas-tax rebate. But prospects for success were clouded, since the proposal is part of a larger package that includes language to open part of Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, or ANWR, to oil and gas drilling — a long-sought GOP priority that’s been repeatedly stymied by congressional Democrats and a few Republicans.

OK, lets start with the basics. If gas prices have gone up about a dollar a gallon, then $100 equals 100 gallons of gas at a price that is as artificially low as the currently price is artificially high. Sounds like a lot? No, it sounds like about 10 weeks-worth for those of us who drive sedans, and less for SUV drivers (not that I care about that demographic). It does nothing for the long haul.

Secondly, plenty of us have been over and over the ANWAR thing, and there just is not enough gas there to make it worth anyone’s while. Americans are overwhelmingly against drilling in the refuge.

Third, while American tax payers get a temporary break on the price of gasoline, the underlying problem is the overwhelming profits of the oil companies, which this proposal does nothing to address. Why should we take money out of the Federal government (which is already hemmoraging because of the current tax cuts) to allow oil companies to continue gouging us at the pump? Only to have critical social infrastructure programs like PELL grants and veteran’s benefits cut further? All while the oil company-endorsed Bush Energy Bill introduced $14 billion in tax cuts for energy companies! We’re basically stealing from ourselves to pay for oil companies stealing from us. . . twice.

In sum, we are supposed to accept drilling in one of the last truly wild landscapes our country has for gas that won’t arrive for ten years (if ever) so we can have a temporary tax cut that lasts us two and a half months, all while looking the other way as Big Oil robs us all blind.

I don’t support it. Not at all.