If the lawmakers would have added one penny to each can of beer, this tax would have been un necessary!!!
Posted on 10/14/2005 6:34:56 PM PDT by Crackingham
Gov. Matt Blunt has publicly opposed a cigarette tax increase, but some key GOP players are quietly working to make sure voters pass it in November 2006.
The Committee for a Healthy Future, the group promoting the ballot initiative to increase cigarette taxes by 80 cents a pack, has hired John Hancock, a spokesman and consultant for the Missouri Republican Party, as a strategist. Hancock was constantly at the side of Blunt, a Republican, during his 2004 campaign for governor.
The campaign also has hired two other Republicans as consultants: Jewell Patek, a former lawmaker who later served as an aide to Blunt when he was secretary of state, and David Barklage, who served as chief of staff to former state Sen. Peter Kinder, now lieutenant governor.
Blunt’s spokesmen have been saying since June that the governor is opposed to increasing the cigarette tax or any other tax, even though lawmakers are struggling to find long-term solutions to address health-care needs for the poor and uninsured.
Jack Cardetti, Missouri Democratic Party spokesman, said the involvement of top Republicans in the tax initiative campaign brings into question whether Blunt truly opposes the idea.
“If Matt Blunt really wanted to kill this proposal, he could make three phone calls and it’d be dead within the month,” Cardetti said.
Blunt’s spokesman, Spence Jackson, said the governor has nothing to do with the contracts Hancock and other Republican consultants take.
“Reasonable people often disagree on issues,” Jackson said. “This is obviously an area of disagreement.”
Proponents of the cigarette tax also have hired two well-connected Democrats –– Steve Glorioso, a Kansas City political strategist who worked on Claire McCaskill’s campaign for governor, and Chuck Hatfield, a Jefferson City lawyer who served as Attorney General Jay Nixon’s chief of staff.
Missouri, which has the third-highest smoking rate in the nation, has the 49th-lowest cigarette tax at 17 cents a pack. Kansas, with a tax of 79 cents per pack, has the 27th-lowest cigarette tax.
The proposed 80-cent tax increase in Missouri would raise an estimated $351 million a year, with $61 million of that going to anti-smoking programs, $100 million to treatment of chronic diseases and smoking-related illnesses among the poor and $190 million to increase Medicaid fees to health-care providers. The Missouri Hospital Association and other health organizations are bankrolling the campaign.
Blunt and the Republican-led legislature this year cut 90,000 people off Medicaid.
The governor, who has been fiercely attacked over the Medicaid cuts, has to know that the cigarette tax would help him politically, Cardetti said.
“He wants both the benefit of the added revenue and the benefit of not supporting a tax increase,” Cardetti said.
“This (Blunt’s opposition) is extremely disingenuous.”
Yeah. Those are known as User Fees and, if carried to a logical outcome, these proposed tobacco taxes should go towards defraying the costs to Smokers arising from their consumption of the taxed commodity. Instead these greedy Pols will use it to buy more influence with their chosen recipients of Pork and other discretionary favors. A corrupt practice if you ask me but what else is new in the era of Big Gov't?
Love your post - Right on the mark, especially the part about 'Sin' Taxes and the rate to be applied to Pols. :-)
You're preaching to the choir there.
NY has some of the highest motor fuel taxes in the nation. These are supposed to go into a "locked box" to form the "dedicated highway fund." In reality, the legislature raids this fund every year to balance the budget. Our roads are crumbling, and our bridges (like the 90 foot tall highway ramp just blocks from the State Capitol) are literally falling down.
Legalized thievery.
The tax failed 49% to 51%.
Did I make that one percent? I don't know but I consider it money well spent.
Eventually, tobacco will be banned, and it will be the same colossal failure that Prohibition of alcohol was, and that the War on Drugs has been.
Tobacco shouldn't be banned. I don't think it will be.
You can say it, but it is a hollow argument. And a slope so steep and slippery that there is literally no limit to the things you could apply that "reasoning" to.
The purpose of the guberment is to provide for the domestic security of the nation, and a limited, defined set of necessities. It is NOT the job, the duty, the prerogative, or the guberment's business to tax based on someone's idea of what is good for everyone one else. Taxes are to be assesed to fund the subjects I have mentioned. That's all.
But, hey, since alcohol is socially acceptable relative to tobacco it's OK to tax a smoker to pay for the costs of alcohol consumption.
powder..patch..ball fire!
The last time they tried this we found out that the 100 million for treatment programs was going to go to the research hospitals here in Missouri...
Great way to gather their support... They couldn't get us to do it with a vote so they are going to try another way...
Bullsh*t
for the record: I am not a smoker. taxes for the sake of taxing make me smoke....
'Robin Hood in reverse:' Retailers foresee problems with cigarette tax
Tuesday, September 27, 2005
By JONATHON DAWE, Statesman Staff Writer
Theft, a thriving black market and a crippling blow to the Missouri economy is what Ron Leone, executive director for the Missouri Petroleum Marketers and Convenience Store Association (MPCA) is anticipating if a newly proposed tax is passed by the voters next year.
A coalition of more than 100 nonprofit groups proposed a new tax of 80 cents per-pack increase on the purchase of cigarettes last week. And, while the proposal is being hailed by anti-smoking advocates, it is receiving unfavorable attention from Leone's organization.
Leone said he would first question the wisdom of the attempted tax increase being so high after Missouri voters defeated a proposed increase a couple years ago.
Leone claims that the MPCA was instrumental in defeating Proposition A, the 50-cent per-pack increase on cigarettes on the November 2002 ballot. Leone said the success was impressive because only 26 percent of the population at the time used tobacco products.
"The Prop A proponents spent in excess of $5.6 million, and MPCA spent only $41,000," Leone said. "That tells me how the voters of Missouri feel about an increased tax. The majority of Missourians don't smoke; but the majority of Missourians are very fair-minded."
Leone said he couldn't help but question the wisdom of proposing a more drastic tax after a smaller one failed.
Although the Committee for a Healthy Future is proposing the collected revenue from the tax go to pay for those who were cut from Missouri's Medicaid roles this year, Leone said he views the proposal as "Robin Hood in reverse."
"There are a lot of corporations involved who stand to benefit from this," Leone said. "They are just trying to use this proposal as a smoke-screen to line their own pockets. They're wanting to basically steal from the poor to give to the rich."
According to figures released by the Committee for a Healthy Future, the proposed tax would raise an estimated $351 million a year. But it would also put Missouri's cigarette sale tax higher than the national average. The Committee has reported that 54 percent of the tax revenue would be used for healthcare assessment and treatment for the uninsured. But Leone remains unconvinced as to the tax's proposed effects.
"If we truly have a state-wide problem, then we should have a state-wide solution," Leone remarked. "We shouldn't tax a minority to pay for other programs.
"What must be taken into consideration is what this tax would do to our economy. The majority of smokers will not stop smoking. They will just go elsewhere to buy cigarettes; and that could cause us to lose our competitive edge over the states that surround Missouri."
Leone predicted slumping sales in all manner of industry if the tax were to pass.
"I think this is just the beginning," Leone said. "This is an incestuous relationship between big businesses and anti-smoking zealots; and, if this passes they will target fast-food next."
Leone said his organization is not opposed to a compromise, though.
"If they would be willing to sit down and talk to us about a lower figure, then we might be O.K.," Leone remarked. "But they would have to come down quite a bit from what they are proposing."
Locally, Randall Swindle, owner of "On the Go" convenience store, is against the proposal.
"I'm dead against it," Swindle said. "I think it would be really bad for business. It isn't fair and it would hurt all convenience stores."
One of the reasons Swindle is against the tax is because he says cigarettes have been taxed enough.
"I think they ought to just leave (cigarettes) alone," Swindle said. "I think most of the smokers have gotten used to the higher prices. But, we just opened this convenience store and we don't want to have to deal with something that would hurt our sales. This tax would definitely hurt our sales."
Leone said he has no doubt the MPCA would defeat the proposed tax, no matter what amount of money may be spent is support of the tax.
"I want to give them one last opportunity to compromise before (the MPCA) goes on the attack," Leone remarked. "But, there's no doubt in my mind that we will defeat this proposal."
Jonathon Dawe can be reached via e-mail at jbdawe@dailystatesman.com
>>>Government officials are similar to crack addicts in that they will do or say anything to get their fix. <<<
Damn, that is a good (and accurate) line.
I'm reminded of what Newt called Bob Dole once:
"Tax collector for the welfare state."
...and their answer? Why, to tax other things at an even higher rate to make up for "lost tax revenue"!
So, once again, the average joe has been sold out by politicians on both sides of the aisle. What a shock.
I've been making that very point regarding sales taxes begetting rampant black market activity with respect to the misnamed "fair tax" NRST nonsense. Naturally, the Kool-Aid drinkers will not tolerate being confused by the facts.
If the lawmakers would have added one penny to each can of beer, this tax would have been un necessary!!!
If the lawmakers would have added one penny to each can of beer, this tax would have been un necessary!!!
You know, i don't smoke and I really don't care for the habit but I find it so idiotic and absurd to raise the tax on cigarettes.
Well, here is one alternative:
Can't stand the high taxes?
Afraid to order off of the Internet?
Then start rolling your own!!! I find everything but the machine downtown at the local Smoke Shop. Also, Rite Aid and grocery stores also sell the bags of tobacco and the filtered tubes.
I roll out a beautiful carton for a little under $8 dollars. Premiums in my state are now up to $45-$50 a carton. Can you imagine the money I have saved over the past 4 years since I now roll my own? It's mind boggling.
under $50.00
$5.75 a bag
$1.99 for 200 filtered tubes
and
Thats the same BS they rammed down our throats when they sued the tobacco companies. None of the money went to my healthcare and no 'cessation' clinics were started. All of the money went to general revenue.
This is just another revenue grab and they will use people like you to do it.
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