First off, SIN TAX can kiss my :moon:

I have been smoking since I was 13 years old...and my 30th b-day is only 8 months away. So, for the majority of my life I have induldged in the ONE vice I have truly ever had. (We aren't going to mention sex right now... )

I started smoking because of the friends I had at the time. (Yes, my parents smoked. BUT, they did their best to prevent me from becoming a smoker...including whipping my ass and taking my ciggs from me every chance they could.)

I continued smoking because it was the ONE thing that actually kept my nerves settled...and me from killing everyone around me. Also, since I had my ciggs, I didn't over-indulge in food whenever I was upset or so far down that nothing could pick me up. (Yeah, I used it as a crutch...but it DID prevent me from getting into heavy drugs or worse things.)

I have quit twice...because I was pregnant with each of my sons. I also tried to not start back up afterwards. Stress has been the main reason that I have started back each time.

I went from smoking indoors (before children) to smoking outdoors, in hopes that my children weren't hurt by my usage of tobacco. But, GUESS WHAT? My children still ended up with medical problems...and all of them had NOTHING to do with my habit.

Now, I smoke inside my home...because of the people that regulate the laws and everything in between. And as far as I know, they can't stop me from doing that...

I have to regulate where I eat out, where I drive, what I watch on tv/movies/dvds/vhs, etc. All because someone who doesn't know me or live my life feels that they know better than I do how to live my own life.

YEAH, I choose to continue to smoke...and fill my body with all the negativity from doing so. BUT IT IS MY BODY DAMMIT!

So, for me, I have to deal with paying anywhere from $1.20 to almost $5 (or more) per pack I smoke. And since we (hubby & I)both buy our ciggs in cartons, we spend between $12 and $50 per carton we buy. Which also means that we roughly spend between $96 and $400 a month to feed our habit.

Yes, I know that that is $$ that could be spent on other things...but when you get so sick from NOT smoking, you really don't have much other choice.

AND, as for the methods around for quitting, they are just as expensive, if not MORE. So, smokers have one of two choices...smoke and be thought of as disgusting and so forth...or we can "conform" and spend just as much trying to kick habits that are, for some, the only way to deal with normal pressures of life.

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NOW, as for the other topic that has been brought up...legalizing the usage of marijuana has been a debated topic since the 1960s. Until our government can figure out a money-making way to legalize the usage, it will continue to be deemed illegal for the majority of our populace.

And all the naysayers can gloat that they were right...that no matter what medicinal properties it has are irrelevant. And anyone who has experienced the medicinal properties (because of cancer, glaucoma, muscle spasms/tremors, etc.) will eventually get tired of the naysayers and continue their usuage -- often in fear of being caught and sentenced for using something that may very well be saving their lives.

Yet another situation that our government thinks they are handling so damn well...

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As for the thought that they may get the hair-brained idea of taxing sex...I'll still do that too.

WHAT I DO IN MY OWN HOME IS MY OWN DAMN BUSINESS! And if I choose to slowly kill myself...that is my choice.

All right, I have added my two cents...someone else want the soapbox??

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Mor Rioghan

Slowly escaping my confines of sensibility...while trying my best to maintain my irrational side.

Mor Rioghan,

Yes mam. Thank you.

The search for government revenue in fiscally tight times tempts legislators to raise revenue by imposing unusually high excise taxes on cigarettes, liquor, gambling, and, in Europe, on gasoline. This type of charge is often called a "sin tax", and appeals to voters who view it as a way of discouraging consumption of certain objectionable products. In one of her threads, Lilith referenced a German city that plans to tax commercial sexual intercourse, so I guess that services should be also included.

In economic terms, the sin tax is not different from any tax designed to discourage consumption. Every dollar taken away from people through this approach is one dollar less saved or spent on other pursuits.

If the government is seeking to make people pay for actions deemed socially costly or sinful, it makes the most sense for these people to be taxed directly for the right to sin. Yet there are very few examples of this binary model of the sin tax. Instead, the modern sin tax is usually triangular. Not only is the consumption itself discouraged by government policy, but all those engaged in feeding the desire to sin, and making the sin available, are also taxed.

This regressive tax is especially cruel towards the poor, who spend a disproportionate amount of their income on products deemed sinful under a consumption tax. It takes money from their pockets when they buy the goods for which they have a strong demand, and leaves less for them to spend on their rent, food, clothing, and the like. The supposed virtue of the consumption tax is that it hits every consumer of the good equally. Yet the poor are the ones that can least afford the tax, are the ones most in need of discretionary income, and are therefore the ones hit hardest. This is neither good statecraft nor good economic policy. It is also unjust.

The sin tax fails to consider the crucial distinction between vice and crime. Before we empower the government with what are, effectively, pastoral responsibilities, we ought to consider fundamental issues regarding the interplay between private morality and public policy.

The sin tax is one of the few taxes presumed to have an overt moral justification. I say "overt" because other taxes imply certain covert moral categories. For example, the US taxes the return on capital at a higher rate than income that flows from pure wages and salaries. This "capital gains tax" implies there is something less morally legitimate about making money through risk and investment than there is from taking home pre-set wages and salaries.

When the state treats a certain behavior as sinful and thus particularly taxable, it assumes certain moral categories. It says that the taxed behaviors are less morally justifiable than other forms of behaviors, and therefore more justifiably taxed. The moral reasoning behind such a tax is clearly evident. Punishing wrong doers is among the usual lists of powers appropriate to government. What is not obvious is why the central state puts itself in the business of determining the sinfulness of certain behavior given that the taxed sins are not directly invasive of other peoples' rights.

Compare smoking and drinking, for example, with crimes against person or property. While the state declares drinking and smoking to be sins vulnerable to added levels of taxation, it also admits that these behaviors are less objectionable than theft or murder. We don't, for example, have anything like a murder tax or a theft tax, although one could suggest that the cost of a good (successful) legal team represents a "tax" on ones behavior. When a citizen steals something from another person, he is not taxed; he is tried and convicted as a criminal. Neither are the sins being taxed considered violations of the civil code. Instead, the state simply taxes the behavior in an attempt to raise revenue and discourage the behavior.

Governments always act on moral premises of some sort. Punishing crimes against person and property are acts of moral sanction. But to entrust the state with sweeping social responsibilities is to forget the crucial distinction between society and state. Democratic government is limited government. It is limited in the claims it makes and in the power it seeks to exercise. Limited government means that a clear distinction is made between the state and the society. Other institutions - notably the family, the Church, educational, economic and cultural enterprises - are at least equally important actors in the society. They do not exist or act by sufferance of the state.

Do we want to charge politicians and bureaucrats with sanctioning sins in areas that are morally ambiguous? Or should this task be left to community, family, church, and tradition -- social institutions that are often more trustworthy in determining the limits of non-violent behavior?

A classic statement regarding non-violent forms of social behavior which are nonetheless frowned upon was made by John Stuart Mill:

"That the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant. He cannot rightfully be compelled to do or forbear because it will be better for him to do so, because it will make him happier, because in the opinion of others, to do so would be wise, or even right. These are good reasons for remonstrating with him, or reasoning with him or persuading him, or entreating him, but not for compelling him, or visiting him with any evil in case he do otherwise. To justify that, the conduct from which it is desired to deter him must be calculated to produce evil to someone else. The only part of the conduct of anyone, for which he is amenable to society, is that which concerns others. In the part which merely concerns himself, his independence is, of right, absolute." 1859 (On Liberty, Chapter 1)

It is a mistake to entrust the modern state with the enforcement of certain moral codes of behavior that extend beyond obvious crimes against person and property. When government is allowed to go beyond these limits and enforce a wider array of moral issues, it will substitute its own form of morality for traditional morality. A government program like recycling, for example, could be deemed more morally worthy than traditional virtues like personal integrity. Obeying securities regulations could be seen as the very heart of virtue, whereas teaching children at home could be seen as a vice. The government's sense of morality, especially when it is influenced by excessive power, is often at war with traditional standards and common sense.

I forget where I read it, or who wrote it, but I remember reading a piece which described the state's temptation to enter private life on behalf of society. Basically, the author asked why limit the government's benevolent involvement to the protection of the individual's body only? Is not the harm a man can inflict on his mind and soul even more disastrous than any bodily evil? Why not prevent him from reading bad books and seeing bad plays, from looking at bad paintings and statues and from hearing bad music? The harm done by bad ideologies, surely, is much more grievous, both for the individual and for the whole society, than that done by drugs.

OK, I overstate my case, but indulge my poetic license for effect.

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Eudaimonia

CunningLinguist it was a corporation

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it's only kinky the first time

it's not the orgasm but getting there thats fun

a shot in the bush is worth two in the hand

whip me, beat me, tie me up, break my arm, but please don't break my heart

"The trouble with the world is that the stupid people are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt" -Bertrand Russell

Booger,

Well I also remeber that this week Iapplied to work at a corporation and I signed a release allowing this company to nterview friends, relatives, co-workers and neighbors to discenr my character.

Gee I hope Succubus Kitty doesn't say anyhting about me being a sex freak and participating in an orgy when I was in college.

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Well sir that seems to be someone else's problem.

The fact that many people do not realize is that it would be nearly impossible to tax marijuana. Marijuana is a weed and weeds will grow in spite of you. I have actually seen where someone has thrown a seed out their window and within a couple of months, they had a plant growing in their front yard and didn't even know it.

Whether grown outdoors or indoors, marijuana is here to stay. The only possible way that the government would be able to tax marijuana if they treated it the way they treat alcohol, legal to buy, illegal to make. For someone who uses marijuana all day everyday, that is simply not an option.

OK.....well....here's a question that just popped into my head while reading all the great reply's above.......

Just exactly wtf are these people who impose these taxes and why didn't I know about their intentions during the obnoxious, muckraking phase of their campaigns? This is the kinda shit I want to know about during a politician's campaign....along with their platform on abortion....etc.! I don't give a shit who they slept with to get where they are today.....I don't give a shit if they smoked pot once in 1969 (and didn't even inhale...??!!)......and all that other crap we find out while reading and watching campaigns! I want to know what they think about smoking and sin tax! I want them to come clean, come out of the shadows and tell me this............when they get their raises that go along with the cost of living (yeah....right!)....does it more than doubley cover the sin taxes imposed during the past fiscal year? Bet it does, and then some......so even if they are smokers themselves.....they don't give a fuck if I pay out the wazzoo.....because their raises make it so that they don't even feel the crunch!

Geezzzzzz.........the things I think of at this time of night!

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Minds are like parachutes. They only work when they are open.

~Thomas Dewar~

This may be a site of interest to all of you smokers who are looking for political information.

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The practice of putting women on pedestals began to die out when it was discovered that they could give orders better from there.~ Betty Grable

If I wanted your opinion, I'd remove the duct tape and ask you for it.~ Me
<~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~>
One man's dream is another man's nightmare~~~~> §¤ Lilith ¤§
~>My Scribbles<~
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What Did You Do Today? Self Defense Class ~Short Sweet Snippets~ § Summer Spin § Story Challenge Submission Pajamas

Oh! TY Lil! Cool site!

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Minds are like parachutes. They only work when they are open.

~Thomas Dewar~

This ex-tobacco farmer in drag weighs in with:

It's a free country, but My God, I wish I could quit!

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"Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former."
- Albert Einstein (1879-1955)

"God is a comedian playing to an audience too afraid to laugh."
- Voltaire (1694-1778)

"I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them."
- Ian L. Fleming (1908-1964)

It is very hard to quit I started when I was 14. I am 31 and have been quit for close to two years because of a heart problem (tho I did quit for 3 years in the past for the same issue at hand). I do not have broncidus every year now and overall feel better but I have not seen where it has helped the heart rythem. I can still say that I do have the desire to smoke one but not as often anymore. I am not sure that you ever loose that desire. I am one of the lucky ones becase I have not gained weight from quiting. I do find that I have a hard time being around smokers not from wanting one but because of the smell. I do feel for anyone who wants or has to quit because it is very hard habit to break. Good luck to all the one who are trying to quit!

I know I am highly outnumbered here, but I have to agree 100% w/Grumble.

I try my best to live in areas in which smoking is banned in public places, certainly in areas that don't allow smoking in restaurants, for example. My daughter is actually allergic to tobacco plus has asthma, and we've had to leave restaurants that had smoking sections because of her reaction to the second-hand smoke at those places. Smoke is like pee in the pool; it doesn't stay in one spot.

I agree that there are many areas in which high taxes or taxes period could be applied and are not, but just because they are not doesn't mean that cigarettes shouldn't be taxed.

Obviously, I'm a nonsmoker.

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Communication is the key.