In today’s New York Times, Thomas Friedman calls Hillary’s and McCain’s “gas-tax holiday” proposal what it really is: money laundering masquerading as energy policy. Both candidates say they want to temporarily suspend the 18.4 cents per gallon federal tax over the summer. Cheap gas is a strange thing to support for two candidates who are also trying to claim green cred. Higher fossil-fuel costs should cause people to consume less, which is a good thing for global warming.

Obama opposes the gas-tax holiday and has said it would only save an average driver about $30 all summer. I haven’t checked out his math, but I don’t see any way in which the McCain-Clinton idea addresses the causes of oil inflation or gets us any closer to a long-term energy solution. It’s like taking a Tylenol to mask the symptoms of something so you can keep doing what you were doing.

“When the summer is over,” Friedman writes, “we will have increased our debt to China, increased our transfer of wealth to Saudi Arabia and increased our contribution to global warming for our kids to inherit.” His column continues with a description of the important renewable-energy credits that are about to lapse because of inaction and disagreement in Congress. Read it here.