Push for online sales taxes picks up steam in Congress

Dickie Durban has been promising passage of this bill to his paymasters every congressional cycle. He’s never yet delivered. A few names have changed over the years but the numbers haven’t.

I live in Oregon. Our senators and reps fight this tooth and nail because sales tax is the 3rd rail in Oregon politics. Many a dem has suddenly found himself thrown out on his keester for forgetting that all politics are local and thinking he could say one thing to the deep pockets and another to the voters.

Good to hear. Thanks.

John Boozman from Arkansas, Bob Corker and Lamar! of Tennessee and Enzi from Wyoming are the 4 Republican Senate co-sponsors.

And 16 Republican U.S. Representative Aaron Schock (R-IL), Dennis Ross (R-PA), Chris Gibson (R-NY), Mario Diaz-Balart (R-FL), Ander Crenshaw (R-FL), Renee Ellmers (R-NC), Don Young (R-AK), Ted Poe (R-TX), Rick Crawford (R-AR), Michael Grimm (R-NY), Charlie Dent (R-PA), Mark Amodei (R-NV), Mike Conaway (R-TX), Kristi Noem (R-SD), Lou Barletta (R-PA), Tim Griffin (R-AR)

That is 7.2% of the GOP delegation and they are all benchwarmers, not one of these dweebs chairs a committee.

This is gaining momentum, and this is the year to do it, Sen. Mike Enzi (R-Wyo.), the lead Senate sponsor, said during a Capitol Hill press conference.

John Boozman from Arkansas, Bob Corker and Lamar! of Tennessee and Enzi from Wyoming are the 4 Republican Senate co-sponsors. ... That is 7.2% of the GOP delegation and they are all benchwarmers, not one of these dweebs chairs a committee

Thanks for the update. A few names on the list are surprising but most are from the states that have "WalMart"-sized constituents or are broke and want businesses from other states be their tax-collectors (with all the empowered state tax bureaucracy and courts that it usually entails).

When I am in another state and buy something from the store, nobody is asking me which state and city I am from to collect the sales tax and send it to that state sales tax/revenue agency)

The reason it's more worrisome this time than in previous times is that now Amazon is interested in multi-state "simplification" (because Amazon is quickly becoming b-a-m via their "affiliates' and expansion of warehousing/distribution centers in many states where they want to expedite and lower the cost of deliveries, to compete with smaller e-tailers and big-box stores) and this bill supposedly addresses "several proposals from the last Congress and includes revisions aimed at winning over skeptics."

Hopefully it will not go anywhere this time as well, because so many Republicans who are "local" small-business owners are confused by and don't see beyond the phony "fairness" issue and misunderstand the nature of this bill and how it will actually hurt them (instead of providing "competitiveness") as well as millions of other businesses and customers.

From interview with the co-founder of Reddit and other ventures (he also actively worked to kill SOPA and PIPA):
The Start-up Guy: Alexis Ohanian - CEA Vision, by Cindy Stevens, 2013 January 06

< snip > ..... Growing up, my father started his own travel agency just before the dot-com boom, and that undoubtedly had an impact on me. It made such an audacious-sounding thing as working for oneself seem possible. I'll also point out that unlike other business people you may have heard of, when world-changing technology like the Internet came along and disrupted his industry, my dad didn't start lobbying Washington, D.C., to pass laws to preserve outdated business models — he adapted his business and survived the huge shift to online travel agencies. ..... < snip >
Can you talk about your bus tour for a free Internet?
The Internet 2012 bus tour was a crowd funded, political-style campaign bus tour, only we were promoting Internet freedom. The bus was literally half red and half blue to show how bipartisan this issue is, with support coming from all Americans. We brought along a half dozen press and a documentary crew to show off just how important this issue is to Americans from Denver to Danville, Ky. The heartland of America is full of startup founders and farmers, students and artists, who all count on the open Internet to do what they do and will fight for it.
Erik Martin (reddit's GM) and I wanted to dispel the myth that it's a fight between Hollywood and Silicon Valley. Innovation and job creation is happening all across this country thanks to the Internet. Without a free Internet, not only do we stifle today's job creators, but also generations more who would never even get the chance to begin. ..... < snip >