EPA ‘Cow Tax’ could charge $175 per dairy cow to curb greenhouse gases

This is a joke man, I fart a lot ... in that case I better start saving.

Why not tax those things which produce greenhouse gases that haven't roamed the planet for thousands of years?

This tax should be limited to machines, not living things, or else we will be paying "shit tax" every time we go.

The factory farms speading Pfiesteria should be taxed up their greedy ag. asses as well.

This gov. doesn't make any fucking sense anyways a tiny slap on the wrist fine, then 5 min. later give all the polluting farms millions to feed our children meat & dairy that their growing bodies would be better off without anyways.I'm refering to the tons of money farms get for the nationwide school "lunch" program.

I don't get it.

How can a small time rancher afford that? An smaller then average stock of 80 cows would cost up words of 14,000.

My brother would be in debt because of this. ha.ha.

To me this sounds like a way for Bush's EPA to make regulating greenhouse gases seem regressive, absurd, and politically unworkable. Everyone knows you can't tax farmers this manner, it wouldn't work economically or politically.

There's sane ways to regulate carbon emissions. We'll have to wait a couple weeks for the serious suggestions to start to come out of our government.

This is a mockery of dem. Al Gorians and Obama wanting greenhouse gases reduced. This should be on Onion News.

I'm not saying there's not a problem with methane release from livestock. The solution presented by Bush's EPA is cynical because its unworkable from the the start. Some background for the uninformed: Bush administration has fought hard against regulating greenhouse gases, the Bush's EPA only has started the process of beginning to regulate them on court order.

A regressive tax on the farmers would never work politically or economically. Thanks for posting a gratuitous picture of a big cow to make your comment stand out.

We eat way too much meat in the US anyway. If they stopped breeding the shit out of cows for runaway meat consumption, we wouldnt have this problem; the tax is meant to cut town demand, which in turn will cut down supply, which will mean less methane being released. Methane together with nitrogen oxide and carbon dioxide work to exacerbate the heat-trapping atmosphere.

thank you tbowman131 for defending my article while i was away at class... yes this is tru. I think you can ask some of the people here on current i don't promote or post bullshit.

and yes this would be a sever cost on even a small farmer. My question is, notice how those with lots of livestock(i believe the number is 250 cows) woul dhave to sign a permit to have that amount of animals. Is there going to be a rate cut for those large quantity livestock farmer? and, what is there gonna be yearly checks to see birth and death rates of those cows? is there special feed which reduces the methane produced? and if there is, is it even economically viable for either the small or larger farmer when banks continue to be stringent lenders and farmers rely on that lending?

many many question arise for me around this issue at least, any others i didn't think of?

This is just another case of the government taking one problem and making it worse. Taxing farmers is going to have an adverse effect on our economy, and have a disproportionate effect on small organic farms and lower income citizens.

What the government should do is provide subsides for aerobic digesters which would take all that cow manure and turn it into clean burning methane to power the farm and organic fertilizer. Not only would this boost our economy it would provide more tax revenues for smarter environmental projects. To bad our government is so ass backwards with their support of corn based ethanol and “clean coal.”

i think meat-eating should be eliminated, but instead of taxing ranchers and factory farmers, why not just stop subsidizing them? the true cost of a pound of beef without subsidies is ridiculous, and there's no reason these costs should be hidden or externalized.

If this affects the price of cheese, then I'm against it!

Another reason to consider a Veg lifestyle... I wonder how much steaks will cost 13$ for chuck eye round.. 7.50 for 2% milk...

If they were to assess a charge it will only be passed on to the consumer who purchases dairy products or items made from said products.

does nobody believe that the business sector should take responsibility for the harm it causes?

i'm sick of hearing about the poor consumer, as if the consumer is entitled to wreak as much destruction as they please lest their budget or lifestyle be effected. chrissake.

i say quadruple the tax and cut the subsidies. i don't eat meat and am tired of subsidizing america's obese, cow-addicted lifestyle.

That picture is awesome...lol!

Ridiculous.