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Here's my SmartMoney.com column for Friday:Was Thursday, October 18, the end of the world? Or at least the beginning of the end of the world?

It felt like it for the NASDAQ, down 36 points.

The mood for the day was set by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, the respected publication of experts on nuclear weapons, which moved its famous symbolic "doomsday clock" two minutes closer to midnight. Since 2002 it's been at seven minutes before midnight, now it's at 5 minutes.

Why? It's not just the increased risk of the use of nuclear weapons by terrorist states like Iran or North Korea. Now the risk symbolized by the doomsday clock includes the risk of ecological disaster brought on by global warming.

Let's pass over the matter of what the heck atomic scientists know about climate change. Nothing, basically. But when it comes to hopping on a bandwagon of hysteria, everyone is welcome.

Fed chief Ben Bernanke was in a doomsday mood too, testifying before Congress on the long term budget outlook for the United States. All I can say is he made global warming look good. With any luck, we'll all drown in melted polar ice water before spiraling Social Security and Medicare obligations melt the economy.

But the real end of the world Thursday was something else entirely. It was when the Democrat-controlled House of Representatives voted to raise taxes. It's the first time the House has voted to raise taxes in 13 years.

Daniel Clifton of the American Shareholders Association says, this might be "the first step in reversing what could be considered the best run for American taxpayers since the creation of the income tax."

It's been a good run for investors, too. According to data from Ibbotson Associates, the real (after-inflation) compound annual return of the S&P 500 over those 13 years was 8.2%, compared to an average of only 7.0% for all the years prior.

Wait! Stop right there! No nasty emails, please! Let me anticipate your objections.

You're probably saying, so what -- the difference between 8.2% and 7.0% is trivial. Oh, really? Suppose you have some money to deposit in the bank. There are two banks, right next door. One pays 8.2% interest, and one pays 7.0% interest. Which one are you going to choose?

You'd better pick the one that pays 8.2%, especially if you're a long-term investor. After a 60-year lifetime of investing, thanks to the magic of compounding you'll have twice as much in your account if you get that extra 1.2% per year interest.

And you're probably saying that over those 13 years we not only didn't raise taxes, we cut them. So what about the government budget? How can we possibly get along without those tax revenues?

We can get along better, actually. In 1993, before the 13 years of no tax hikes began, the federal deficit was 3.9% of GDP. Today, after 13 years of tax cuts, it's about 2.5%.

And back in 1993 the cumulative federal debt was 49% of GDP. Now it's only 39%.

So let's see here. We cut taxes for 13 years. The stock market performed better. The deficit went down. The debt went down.

So what's the stupidest thing we could possibly do now? That's right (all at once, now): raise taxes.

And that's just what the House did yesterday. It's the beginning of the end of the world.

What the House did, exactly, was this: it imposed $8 billion in new taxes on the American energy industry. Yes, the greedy goniffs who gouge you at the pump for the gasoline made from the oil they had to drill ten miles through sub-ocean rock on the other side of the world to get for you. Those guys.

Stop kidding yourself. Don't get distracted by the pretty words in the same legislation that spends some of the money on cool-sounding "alternate energy" technology. A tax is a tax, no matter how it's spent. And a tax on them is a tax on you. As sure as night follow day, $8 billion in new taxes for the energy industry means $8 billion in higher prices at the pump -- for you.

Another tax increase could happen in the next couple months without anyone voting for it at all.

Unless a new law is passed to prevent it from happening, in the 2007 tax year the threshold for individual taxpayers to qualify for higher Alternative Minimum Tax rates will revert back to its 2002 levels. About 20 million people who think of themselves as middle class, people who never had to pay AMT before, will have to pay it this year. The average hit per taxpayer will be something like $4,000.

Because of the details of the way AMT is calculated, it hits taxpayers hardest if they live in states that have high state and local income taxes. Those states -- like New York and California -- are dominated by Democratic voters. So there's a decent chance that the Democrat-controlled congress will do something to prevent this tax hike from happening.

But last week the House passed so-called "pay-as-you-go" rules that require that any tax cut be offset by a tax increase, or by spending cuts. Do you think this new Congress is going to cut spending? I don't. That means if they stop the AMT tax-hike, they'll just have to raise some other tax to make up for it.

And you and I both know which tax they're going to want to raise: the taxes on dividends and capital gains that were slashed in 2003.

Lower taxes for investors kicked off one of the best bull markets in history and sent the Dow Jones Industrial Average to new all-time highs. If those taxes are raised, it's bye-bye for stocks.

As the year plays out, investors are going to have to seriously ask themselves whether this new Democrat-controlled Congress might just be the end of the world.

It's five minutes to midnight right now. Don't fall asleep.

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