Posted on 07/17/2007 7:15:30 AM PDT by tlb
As part of an increase in tobacco taxes designed to pay for children's health insurance, the nickel-per-cigar tax that has ruled the industry could rise to as much as $10 per cigar.
"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 Newman, who runs the Tampa business founded by grandfather Julius Caesar Newman. "They had the Boston Tea Party for less than this."
The Democrat controlled Congress has sought an extra $35-billion to $50-billion for the state children's health insurance program. The program distributes payments to the states to help buy coverage for kids not poor enough for Medicaid.
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 the legislation has dragged cigars along for the ride.
Under the proposed bill, taxes on "large cigars," a category that includes all but the tiny cigars sold in 20 packs like cigarettes, would rise to 53 percent.
A U.S. Senate version of the bill under consideration today in the Finance Committee sets the maximum tax per cigar at $10.
(Excerpt) Read more at sptimes.com ...
ping
You can bet Ted Kennedy won’t have to pay the tax on his cigars.
Is this a FL tax or a national tax?
The government does not care about whether you smoke or not. This is a ploy to get their hands on more money by demonizing a group that most people don’t like. I don’t smoke myself, but I refuse to play into their scheme to get even more money when they already can’t manage what they’re taking now.
And Bill Clinton. ;)
When in the course of human events...
ping
So what happens if everyone who smokes cigarettes decides to quit ?
This is enouigh to make me rethink my choices or buy them from the indian reservations.
National.
There’s a Monica joke in there somewhere, but I’m not going to touch it.
Sometimes you just have to wonder if they’re not intentionally trying to start an insurrection.
Oh you silly Dems. Now I’ll just have to buy all my cigars in Cabo instead of just the Cubans.
Dirt bags all!
I don’t agree with this but the headline is misleading. To me it suggests that EVERY cigar will have a $10 tax. But that’s not what the story says.
‘s OK.
I buy my Cubans at the British PX on Ramstein Air Base. Germans also sell them at a good price.
Has anyone caught on to the tax scam yet? You ain’t seen nothin yet.
Socialism will rapidly kill the country, one penny at a time.
These bastards in Congress really have their priorities straight, don't they? Our borders are overrun with freeloaders, we face a daily threat of attack from a transnational terrorist movement, Federal spending is out of control..... and all our elected representative can seem to do is dream up new ways of separating us from our hard-earned wages in order to purchase the loyalty of people who live off the taxpayers. And when they're not doing that, they are trying to figure out how to get our guns away from us.
I know that I am not alone when I say that having always imagined myself to be an even-tempered, moderate and reasonable person, I am very quickly becoming radicalized by the continuing assault on my freedom and security. No matter what, they're not getting my cigars or my guns, however I must obtain them. So, Congress: stick that in your pipe and smoke it. Or better yet, just stick it.
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