Gunpowder Chronicle posted on January 2, 2008 10:00 PM | Rating:
| Views: 151
Since O'Guvnah has decided to make the consumers of legal tobacco products his bitches through higher taxes and smoking bans, one wonders if O'Guvnah is deliberately overlooking the consumers of legal adult beverages on purpose or because of his heritage.
Let's face it-- alcohol does cause as many, if not more, health problems as smoking. I still have never heard of a cigarette killing people in a motor vehicle. Frank Perdue and Kumar Barve have never been pulled over for "smoking and driving". And just as a smoker's tobacco smoke irritates others in bars, alcohol has the distinct ability to turn people into assholes. Just look what it does to college students.
And let's talk about the environment. Up here on the Baltimore-York Turnpike (or the Susquehanna Trail for my PA readers), a favorite pastime of drunken hicks is to pitch bottles at mailboxes and houses close to the road. Last time I checked, cigarettes and cigars had the aerodynamic qualities of the Italian Air Force- they fly apart and crash into the ground, with little left to find.
So why no increase in the alcohol excise tax? It's not like we have a huge brewing and distilling industry in Maryland. Or maybe it is the vintners -- you know, that industry that is so big in Maryland it outsizes only conservative political consultants and horse racing for smallest industries in Maryland.
It seems to me that if O'Government wants to get all fundamentalist and self-righteous, the excise tax might be a good place to start. Plus, like cigarettes, alcohol is recession (and tax increase) proof.
Or maybe O'Guvnah is giving tribute to his hero the Kennedys. You see, the Kennedy money comes from... wait for it... wait for it.... BOOTLEGGING! How appropriate. The old saying is that alcohol was invented by God so the Irish couldn't rule the world.
Who knew that the Irish O'Guvnah was elected so we wouldn't tax alcohol more.