Beware of bicycles
In March, Washington state Rep. Ed Orcutt, apparently upset that bicyclists use the state’s roads without paying the state gasoline tax for highway maintenance, proposed a 5 percent tax on bicycles that cost more than $500, pointing out that bicyclists impose environmental costs as well.
Since carbon dioxide is a major greenhouse gas, he wrote one constituent (and reported in the Huffington Post in March), bike riders’ “increased heart rate and respiration” over car drivers creates additional pollution.
Days later, he apologized for the suggestion that bicyclists actually were worse for the environment than cars.
— News of the Weird