speaking of Maryland, I got this:
http://weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/014/457jcxov.asp?pg=1
Through the Roof!
Democrats fall in love with taxes again.
by Stephen Moore
12/17/2007, Volume 013, Issue 14
It wasn’t so long ago that politicians assured voters that they would “raise taxes only as a last resort,” as Michael Dukakis put it in 1988. When lawmakers did increase taxes, they would wring their hands and somberly declare how painful and distasteful this decision was. But nowadays in the Democratic party, raising taxes is regarded as a badge of honor and cause for celebration.
Consider the goings-on in Maryland. Three weeks ago Governor Martin O’Malley and the Democratic legislature in Annapolis passed a super-sized $1.3 billion tax increase. The package included higher income taxes, business taxes, sales taxes, computer taxes, tobacco taxes, and gas taxes. Pretty much anything that moves in the state got its taxes upped. It’s not just the largest tax hike in the state’s history but the first time in the history of the United States that a state has lifted its income tax, sales tax, and business tax all in the same year.
The mood in the state capital after the massive tax package was finally enacted at 2:00 A.M. November 19 was not grim, but joyous. The politicians and the entire House gallery, which was packed with lobbyists who figure to get a good chunk of these tax dollars, erupted in spontaneous and prolonged applause. The applause soon turned into a back-slapping standing ovation. One observer noted, “You would have thought the Baltimore Orioles had just won the World Series.” O’Malley had a grin on his face as large as the Baltimore harbor as he
raised his arms in triumph at the bill signing ceremony. E.J. Dionne of the Washington Post serenaded O’Malley as a Democrat who isn’t afraid of big government or raising taxes to fund it.
O’Malley is among a group of rising star Democrats in state capitals that seem to relish the opportunity to raise taxes—and not just on the rich. In Wisconsin, Governor Jim Doyle pushed a “universal” health care plan paid for with a 10 percent payroll tax surcharge levied on every working man and woman in the state. The measure would have made Milwaukee and Green Bay not just the highest-tax cities in the United States, but just about anywhere in the world outside of Sweden. Doyle is considered a “moderate” in the 21st-century Democratic party.
“Its not just the largest tax hike in the states history but the first time in the history of the United States that a state has lifted its income tax, sales tax, and business tax all in the same year.”
O’Moron is an idiot. His voters will get what they deserve.
That is some world-class progressiveness, brother!