Posted on 11/07/2006 2:34:10 AM PST by SheLion
I stopped to drop off a carton of cigarettes for a disabled veteran at a nursing home. They have a bleak area outside where they can enjoy a cigarette at fixed intervals. He was reading an absentee ballot about Proposition 86.
He said, “This is crazy! We can’t afford $70 for a carton of cigarettes. That’s the most prejudiced, hateful proposition I ever read.”
Then he asked me, “Can this pass?”
I said, “Are you old enough to remember bus segregation, because some people didn’t think some people looked as nice as they did?”
He said, “Haven’t we learned anything from history? Who’s promoting this crime, this time?”
I said, “They are people with a drug addiction. The drug of venomous, vindictive, cold-hearted hate. A drug ten times worse than heroin. It forms a hard callous around the heart, like a stone, and destroys logical, reasoning ability, so they can’t quit.”
He lifted his head from his hand, and looking up, through eyes like a saint’s, he said, “Then I feel sorry for them. Their burden is greater than mine.”
Not wanting to contaminate the virtue of his words, I said, “Yes, I guess we should feel sorry for them.”
What I really thought was, the trail of their whole life is littered with their victims. If they could eliminate every smoker on earth, they would just channel another fanatical, inflictive vendetta. It’s their drug of choice. They can’t quit.
Gangs, organized crime, and terrorists all love 86 because it will give them a new smuggling operation to make $$$ off of.
Well, if this passes, then we can pretty much know who is raping in the illegal money!
Huge cigarette taxes that don't do anything except make more pork for politicians.
When you're too gutless to cut spending, stick it to the smokers and tell them it's for their own good!
Prohibition has never solved a problem yet. Someone will find that niche, good or bad, and make money of it.
I just read the prop ... an EXTRA $2.60 per pack - you know I don't feel the same way about smoking around other people as you do...but damn... an extra $2.60 is getting into Boston Tea Party Territory.
I've got to agree with you on this - at that point its not really about just taxation anymore - its back door prohibition and an invitation to smuggling.
Canada tried this years ago, and so many people smuggled in cigarettes that it was worthless.
If I still lived in Arizona I would be tempted to make big bucks circumventing liberals.
And did you see the states "impartial" analysis?
http://www.voterguide.ss.ca.gov/props/prop86/analysis86.html
It talks about every possible impact EXCEPT the impact on the people being taxed.
Exactly! And it's a Legal Product for heaven's sake. I wonder if any other group would put up with having their Twinkies or Beer and Wine taxed this way. I doubt it.
And when something hits our Seniors and Vets, it's going way over the top.
Maine already raised the taxes to $2 dollars on a pack and $20 dollars on a carton. Can you believe this?
Sure, so the general non-smoking public will just see the highlights and think that this is a "good thing." After all, our lawmakers support it. It MUST be good.
~barf!
The crazies that are calif will kill one of their golden gooses if this passes. The socialist state uses ciggy taxes to pay for all kinds of crap and if this passes folks will quit in droves. Then tax revenues will actually fall leaving the politicos to scramble for other ways to steal from the populace.
>>The crazies that are calif will kill one of their golden gooses if this passes. The socialist state uses ciggy taxes to pay for all kinds of crap and if this passes folks will quit in droves. Then tax revenues will actually fall leaving the politicos to scramble for other ways to steal from the populace.<<
I talked to a CEO buddy in Cali yesterday who said these are "good taxes" because they were carefully crafted to raise revenue without driving industry out of the state...
I'm voting no because I've just about reached the 'if it's a tax no matter what tax vote no' category. I'll have to read it, but does it prevent getting the product from out of state? Heck, I'd just have my friends buy and send me cartons from NC, they are 10 to 12 dollars less a carton now without this tax.
Well, maybe one-fourth will quit smoking, but the majority will start rolling their own or crossing the state borders, etc. Where there is a will there is a way. And don't forget: people are still ordering cigarettes off of the Internet.
That's the trouble with this............the lawmakers talk out of both sides of their mouths! They say they want a smoke free state, but then they raise taxes on cigarettes to balance their stupid budgets. We all know they can't have both!
Is there really anything such as a good tax?
WHAT industry???? The mom and pop's struggling to make ends meet and keeping their little businesses open? I doubt very much if this is going to help any of them!
I live in New Hampshire where the tobacco and alcohol taxes are lower than any other New England state. We have stores on just about every road coming into NH that survive mainly on selling cigs and liquor. The majority of the license plates in the parking lot are not from NH.
Oh I remember! When we used to travel in and out of Maine, we would make one last stop at the NH State Liquor store. You know the one. Right there on the Maine border? Lots cheaper!
Mainers who are lucky enough to live close to the NH border spend their money there, and not in Maine. Is there any wonder? :)
>>Is there really anything such as a good tax?<<
Well, there are taxes that are less fair and more outrageous - therefore, the logically must be taxes that are at least more fair and less outrageous.
But good taxes, no....
Now some user fees I like because they cut consumption of government services that people will overuse if they are "free."
Like if a $5 fee to use the emergancy room for a non-emergancy at a public hospital cuts usage by 40% then thats a good user fee.
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