$10 Cigar Tax!

July 18, 2007

Cigarmakers and their customers are in a panic over a proposal to raise the federal tax on cigars -- now a nickel -- to as much as $10.

Congress -- meeting in smoke-free rooms -- is looking for an extra $35 billion to $50 billion for the state children's health insurance program and hopes to raise most of it through excise taxes on products like tobacco.

Cigarettes, which accounted for more than 95 percent of tobacco tax collections last year, are the main focus of the bill -- federal taxes on a pack would jump from 39 cents to $1.

But cigars would not escape.

There is currently 4.8 cents-per-cigar tax cap but under the proposed bill, taxes on "large cigars," a category that includes all but the tiny cigars sold in packs of 20 like cigarettes, would rise to 53 percent.

A version of the bill being considered by the Senate Finance Committee sets the maximum tax per cigar at $10.

"I'm not sure in the history of man, since our forefathers founded the country in 1776, that there's ever been a tax increase of 20,000 percent," said Eric Newman, who runs a Tampa cigar shop, according to the St. Petersburg Times. "They had the Boston Tea Party for less than this."

Others were equally befogged.

"I thought there was a typo. I thought they meant 10 cents per cigar, not $10 per cigar, said Norm Sharp, president of the Cigar Association of America, the Times reported.

Of course, cigar sales are just the merest wisp of the cigarette market. In 2006, Americans bought nearly 400 billion cigarettes and only 5.3 billion cigars

Liberalism’s Flaw

If you listen to liberals for very long you will begin to notice several tenets they generally espouse. Since we’ve just had an election, I want to point out one of the more popular creeds that we’ve heard from liberals of late.

Liberals rightly point out that the right wing is intolerant of homosexuals unless you are a high level republican staff member or congressman and then you have to remain in the closet, ala Mark Foley.

Liberals rightly point out that the gay marriage bans on the ballot recently in many states are discriminatory. They rightly point out that discriminating against a group of people is a bad thing.

They will point this out until they need discrimination to serves their own ends.

The curtains aren’t even measured in the congressional offices and already you are beginning to hear the chorus coming from the left to re-institute the estate tax.

See liberals are against discrimination, unless they perceive you to be rich and then it is perfectly acceptable to discriminate. Liberals have no problem with the government confiscating your money when you die.

They ordinarily couch their argument by saying that the estate tax is only applicable for two percent of the population or some figure there about. But if the law applies to only two percent of the population then it is discriminatory by definition.

A law that doesn’t apply equally to the entire population is precisely what liberals will tell you is wrong with a ban on gay marriage. But the class envy leftists easily turn a blind eye when it comes to what they perceive as sticking it to the rich.

Liberals will yell at the tops of their lungs about oil companies receiving tax breaks from the government. They have a valid point.

Corporations don’t deserve tax breaks that the rest of us cannot take advantage of, just as certain segments of the population do not deserve to have to an unequal portion of their money taken by the government.

Whether the discrimination is based on race, religion, sexual orientation or financial status, it is still discrimination. Laws need to apply equally no matter a person’s account balance. Aren’t we told constantly that laws shouldn’t favor the rich, the inverse applies as well.

If a rich man is pulled over for speeding doesn’t he get the same fine a poor man receives? The law sees no distinction. Why should the law apply differently when it comes to a person’s estate?

Liberal arguments will vary across the spectrum as to the reasons why it is beneficial for the government to confiscate someone’s money. What it boils down to however is a seemingly innate class envy that is ingrained in most liberals.

It’s fairly easy to fall into this trap when we see all of the corruption and graft that has taken place in Washington lately. If you are of a mind to say that the rich have benefited disproportionately from tax breaks, I won’t argue with you. The income tax is unconstitutional to start with and no matter what, it is always the middle and lower income folks who pay the most, they’re the majority of the population. But that still doesn’t give the government just cause to confiscate people’s money at the barrel of a gun because they die.