For those that dip or smoke.... about time to stock up!

[Vedubin01]

Its going to get more expensive to smoke or dip....

You know.... its for the children!


Senate Passes SCHIP Bill with Federal (61¢ a pack) Tobacco Tax Increase
Join Together ^ | 1/30/09

The U.S. Senate voted 66-32 this week to approve a major expansion of the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), funded with a 61-cent-per-pack increase in the federal tobacco tax, Reuters reported Jan. 30.

The $32.8-billion SCHIP bill would expand eligibility for the health-insurance program to an additional 11 million children; about 7.4 million kids are covered by SCHIP now. The measure was passed twice last year, but vetoed both times by President George Bush.

A similar measure has already passed the House of Representatives, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said a final vote could come next week after differences between the two bills are ironed out.

Some critics objected to the bill because it would allow states to enroll moderate-income families and does not include a ban on legal immigrants from getting coverage unless they have been in the U.S. for at least five years.

[daniel]

sounds good to me.

[bmw325csi]

dip?

[325_e30]

dip?

when you dip, i dip, we dip....

[PhillyG]

dip?

Chewing tobacco.

[kronus]

I... I don't see why that's bad.

[Mossman]

a law that actually makes sense, wow. People choose to do a self destructive activity that makes health care more expensive for everyone, only fair you should help pay for poor kids to get healthcare they need. Reparations for when smokers didn't know second hand smoking was hurting their kids lungs.

[Vedubin01]

is beer next?

[mrsleeve]

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

would not surprise me

is fuel next??????

[lowlightbw]

i hope so, then fatty foods, then stretched tires

[Raxe]

At least it's going to a worthwhile cause.

[PhillyG]

This is a big problem for me as I am in the slowly commit suicide program, and now its really getting expensive!

[Peterkaczynski]

good smoking smells

[Vedubin01]

is fuel next??????

Oh its coming..... how about $1 tax on gas?

The republicans have really lost their mind. I just wish there would be a conservative party and allow the rest of the Republican party to ROT!

2010 and 2012 is not looking good for their party. Gutless fucks!

Lugar Backs $1-a-Gallon Gas Tax To Help Cure "Our Oil Addiction"
Fort Wayne Journal Gazette ^ | January 31, 2009 | Sylvia A. Smith

WASHINGTON - Every gallon of gas should cost $1 more, Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., said, so Americans buy less and the country imports less foreign-made oil.

In a Washington Post column dated Sunday, Feb. 1, Lugar endorsed the proposal of a conservative columnist, who advocated the $1-a-gallon tax last month. Charles Krauthammer said the $1 tax should be returned to people through lower payroll taxes or higher Social Security payments so their out-of-pocket expenses are the same.

"Americans sent nearly $430 billion to other countries in 2008 for the cost of imported oil an amount equal to almost half of President Obama's stimulus package," Lugar wrote. "Those hundreds of billions should be spent to build a new energy economy here, not shipped to dangerous regimes overseas."

Lugar said there's recent evidence that higher pump prices make Americans use less gas.

"When gasoline prices topped $4 a gallon last year," he said, "Americans chose to use less, leading to a major drop in gasoline consumption."

That's a good thing, Lugar has said repeatedly, because it makes the country less reliant on oil-producing countries that threaten U.S. national security. Three years ago he called dependence on foreign oil "the albatross of national security."

"Nearly every major foreign policy challenge we face is aggravated by our continued addiction to oil," he wrote in the Washington Post column, pointing to what can happen when energy is used as a weapon, such as Russia's vise on Ukraine. Russia provides nearly all of Ukraine's heating oil and has raised prices or restricted exports during two cold winters.

"A new president and changed economic conditions offer the chance to take a bold step toward freeing our nation from the grip of foreign petroleum," Lugar wrote.

Lugar said governments have two ways of changing people's behavior: make it illegal or tax it. A price increase through higher taxes, he said, is "almost always the most efficient, least invasive and most transparent remedy for market failure."

He said increasing the cost of filling up a gas tank would underscore the true cost of "our oil addiction" that includes not only the price of a barrel of oil but the "national security, economic vulnerability and environmental damage" of imported oil.

With higher gas prices, Lugar said, consumers would demand more fuel-efficient vehicles, choose non-petroleum alternatives to power them and find public transit options that work.

"Pricing gasoline to reflect its true cost to the nation would help spur a vast market in which oil alternatives such as advanced biofuels would become competitive and innovation would flourish," he said.

Lugar said Krauthammer's suggestion for returning the $1-a-gallon tax to consumers is an important part of the idea. If reducing the payroll tax and increasing Social Security payments is too complicated, he said, "the government could regularly send a check to everyone over 18."

Lugar is the first senator to endorse the $1-a-gallon tax and said he's ready to work with the Obama administration to push it.

The White House has not commented directly on Lugar's proposal. But in December, Obama said he opposes a gas tax that would be used for developing alternative energy.

"Putting additional burdens on American families right now, I think, is a mistake," Obama said in a December "Meet the Press" interview. However, he was not asked about the idea of increasing the price of gas with a per-gallon tax that would be refunded to consumers.

Lugar wrote that "no tax is perfect, and some special provisions may be necessary for individuals and groups disproportionately affected. But we as a nation are already suffering every day from our oil dependence, and decisive measures are needed."

[brandon11130]

I... I don't see why that's bad.

Statistically the lowest class are the people who spend the greatest majority of their income on tobacco products, by putting a tax on that you are pushing them further down. Up the price and people don't quit smoking, they just struggle further, it didnt work in NJ or NY. These people are the same people that are struggling to pay high healthcare costs. This bill makes absoloutly no sence. If they want to lower healthcare costs they should go right to the problem tort law and the fucking frivolous lawsuits against the doctors. That and the pharmaceutical companies and all their lobbyists in bed with all of our politicians.

Its going to get more expensive to smoke or dip....



You know.... its for the children!

Every time I hear the phrase "for the children" I can be assured there are millions of dollars of pork and earmarks attached to it. Never has so much wrong been done in the name of "the children" than in our government.