New FCC Rules and New Taxes

You know that government has been chomping at the bit to get their greedy hands into the internet because of its enormous potential for taxes,taxes and more taxes.

FCC's net neutrality rules open door to new fee on Internet service

Recently adopted net neutrality regulations soon could make your monthly Internet bill more complicated — and potentially more expensive. 

Every month, consumers pay a small fee on their phone bills for a federal program that uses the money — a total of $8.8 billion raised nationwide last year — to provide affordable access to telecommunications services in rural areas, underserved inner cities and schools. 

Now the fee could start appearing on broadband bills too, in a major expansion of the nearly two-decade-old Universal Service Fund program.
It's not clear yet, however, if most consumers would end up paying more in total USF fees than they do now. 

In approving the tough rules for online traffic in February, the Federal Communications Commission put broadband in the same regulatory category as phone service, opening the door for the charges. ~snip~

To the government,especially democrats, the only reason for anything to exist is to tax it to fill the government coffers.
The internet will be no different as other forms of communication or entertainment go the way of the IBM Selectric typewriter.

Now that the FCC has seized jurisdiction of the internet the door will be opened to levy taxes on it at will driving up the cost and reducing the reliability.

Don't Blame the IRS....they just don't like us

Remember when we had a responsive government....yeah me neither.

IRS ignoring 60 percent of taxpayers’ calls as deadline looms

IRS Commissioner John Koskinen said Tuesday that service at his agency has gotten so bad that they are ignoring more than 60 percent of taxpayers’ phone calls during this tax season.
Speaking at the National Press Club, Mr. Koskinen pleaded with more money, saying a budget boost would help them staff their overwhelmed customer service lines. He also said it would help reverse staffing cuts in their compliance division, where he said the government will lose $2 billion this year in money it would otherwise have been able to collect if it had better staffing.
Congress has cut or held the agency’s funding static for several years now, with lawmakers deeming the agency recalcitrant in solving problems, and unrepentant for having targeted tea party groups for intrusive scrutiny.~snip~

Need I remind everyone what happens if we ignore the IRS?
Unless you're a race pimp and Obama is our BFF.

The Marijuana Gap

Here's an interesting turn.
A couple of states are suing Colorado because pot is legal there.

(emphasis added)
Nebraska and Oklahoma Sue Colorado Over Marijuana Law

DENVER — Two heartland states filed the first major court challenge to marijuana legalization on Thursday, saying that Colorado’s growing array of state-regulated recreational marijuana shops was piping marijuana into neighboring states and should be shut down.
The lawsuit was brought by attorneys general in Nebraska and Oklahoma, and asks the United States Supreme Court to strike down key parts of a 2012 voter-approved measure that legalized marijuana in Colorado for adult use and created a new system of stores, taxes and regulations surrounding retail marijuana.
While marijuana remains illegal under federal law, officials have largely allowed Colorado and other states to move ahead with state-run programs allowing medical and recreational marijuana. But the lawsuit from Nebraska and Oklahoma, where marijuana is still outlawed, argues that Colorado has “created a dangerous gap” in the federal drug-control system.
“Marijuana flows from this gap into neighboring states,” the suit says, undermining their marijuana bans, “draining their treasuries, and placing stress on their criminal justice systems.”~snip~

I have a hard time believing the “draining their treasuries" claim seeing as how asset forfeiture is a big thing with states. Along with criminal penalties asset forfeiture, like taxes, assures an income stream. As far as stressing their criminal justice system there's an easy remedy for that.
There's another option besides making it legal and taxing the crap out of it or making it illegal and seizing property and levying fines.
Decriminalize the use or possession of pot in small amounts. Say around a pound and allow the private sale or bartering between individuals and place a limit on the number of plants that can be cultivated on ones private property.

I'm against out and out legalization on the grounds that it simply creates another revenue stream for greedy local and state governments to squander away.... like they do all taxes.
Legalizing it, as the article says, just creates a new system of taxes and regulations along with inefficient, unionized and incompetent government workers along with it.

Law enforcement should be using their resources to go after murderers,rapists,robbers and others who commit dangerous crimes against society.
Not wasting their time going after recreational pot users cause that really is a strain on the criminal justice system.

When We All Become Criminals

The whole Eric Gardner episode is an illustration of the heavy handedness of political power, Somehow we have gotten away from the idea that in a truly free society government interferes in the life of its citizens as little as possible thereby creating a situation where just about anyone can be arrested.

Law Puts Us All in Same Danger as Eric Garner

On the opening day of law school, I always counsel my first-year students never to support a law they are not willing to kill to enforce. Usually they greet this advice with something between skepticism and puzzlement, until I remind them that the police go armed to enforce the will of the state, and if you resist, they might kill you.
I wish this caution were only theoretical. It isn’t. Whatever your view on the refusal of a New York City grand jury to indict the police officer whose chokehold apparently led to the death of Eric Garner, it’s useful to remember the crime that Garner is alleged to have committed: He was selling individual cigarettes, or loosies, in violation of New York law.
The obvious racial dynamics of the case -- the police officer, Daniel Pantaleo, is white; Garner was black -- have sparked understandable outrage. But, at least among libertarians, so has the law that was being enforced. Wrote Nick Gillespie in the Daily Beast, “Clearly something has gone horribly wrong when a man lies dead after being confronted for selling cigarettes to willing buyers.” Republican Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, appearing on MSNBC, also blamed the statute: “Some politician put a tax of $5.85 on a pack of cigarettes, so they’ve driven cigarettes underground by making them so expensive.”~snip~

The reality is that this actually goes way beyond cigarettes and black markets, what it's really about is just how much are we going to allow government to criminalize our activities.
For instance people should wear a seat belt because it's a good idea but a lot of states have mandatory seat belt laws that impose a fine if you or your passengers are caught not wearing one.
While not an arrest-able offense ignoring or not paying the fine is.
Warrants are issued for over due fines all the time and if you are confronted by a police officer then you are subject to arrest...by force if necessary. The reality is that government really requires you to wear a seat belt and if you don't pay a fine then they will potentially use force.
Is that an appropriate use of force by police? Over not wearing a seat belt?
Because that is really what instigated a potentially violent arrest.
Cigarettes or seat belts the question is do we really want to put citizens and police in these kinds of situations?
If they are it's not the cops fault but the politicians who pass ill considered laws in order to pander to specific groups.

Then there's the tyranny of the government using laws and regulations to target groups and individuals due to their political beliefs. Like the IRS did to conservative groups.
I've had the IRS pursue me for owing around $600.00, I'm politically conservative. Al Sharpton, liberal/democrat/race pimp, owes 4 million dollars and as far as I know still owes.

As Ann Coulter said, do not stand between a liberal and his taxes" that was Eric Gardner's mistake and the truth is it could happen to anyone.

Lower Gas Prices? Hang on to your Wallet

So here we are finally enjoying lower fuel prices for our cars and trucks. Savings for everyone right?
So of course the leftists are in a "raise the gas tax mode".

The gas tax has been fixed at 18 cents for two decades. Now would be a great time to raise it

Nationally averaged gas prices ticked down a little lower today -- yet again -- to $2.75 per gallon. They're now more than 50 cents lower than they were a year ago. So no wonder, at a time like this, the murmur is growing: Maybe Congress ought to think about raising the national gasoline tax.
It was last raised, in the year 1993, to 18.4 cents per gallon. That's over 20 years ago, and gas prices at the time were close to the now unimaginable $1.00 per gallon mark. Yet the amount of the gas tax was fixed and not tied to inflation -- so it has not changed since. (U.S. states also charge gasoline taxes; the national average is about 23.5 cents.)
"It’s been a generation since gas taxes were increased at all," says Paul Bledsoe, a senior fellow on energy at the German Marshall Fund. "So they are incredibly low by historic levels."~snip~

Because we all know what great stewards of our tax money the government is. These guys can't even wait for people to enjoy the benefits of spending less on gasoline before they're calling for a rise in revenue for the Highway Trust Fund.
You can also guess about the scheming going on in the blue states.
California is trying to regulate the sale of gas with cap and trade.

California Attempts to Regulate the Sale of Gas Under Cap-and-Trade

So it looks like we'll have a choice, if market forces don't turn the price of fuel around then the government will be more than willing to do it on its own.
Ain't we lucky to have them look out for us by raising the shit out of our taxes in one way or the other?

The Arrogance of the EPA

Looks like the IRS will have to share the moniker of most oppressive government agency with the EPA. While the IRS says "we'll do as we damn well please and don't have to answer to anybody" the EPA says basically the same thing.

EPA Chief Promises To Go After Republicans Who Question Agency Science

 Environmental Protection Agency administrator Gina McCarthy has issued a warning to Republicans who continue to question the integrity of the agency’s scientific data: we’re coming for you.
McCarthy told an audience at the National Academy of Sciences on Monday morning the agency will go after a “small but vocal group of critics” who are arguing the EPA is using “secret science” to push costly clean air regulations.
“Those critics conjure up claims of EPA secret science — but it’s not really about EPA science or secrets. It’s about challenging the credibility of world renowned scientists and institutions like Harvard University and the American Cancer Society,” McCarthy said, according to Politico.
“It’s about claiming that research is secret if researchers protect confidential personal health data from those who are not qualified to analyze it — and won’t agree to protect it,” she added. “If EPA is being accused of secret science because we rely on real scientists to conduct research, and independent scientists to peer review it, and scientists who’ve spent a lifetime studying the science to reproduce it — then so be it.”
Republicans Sen. David Vitter of Louisiana and Rep. Lamar Smith of Texas have led the charge on pressing the EPA to make publicly available the scientific data behind its clean air regulations. McCarthy promised she would make such data publicly available during her confirmation process last year. Now her refusal to cough up the data has angered Republicans.~snip~

On top of the fact that the EPA's regulations are helping push electric rates ever higher they don't seem to feel the need to justify their onerous regulations by sharing the data they use to continuously oppress the taxpayers with ever larger expenditures of our tax dollars.
This is another government agency that needs to be eliminated by congress.

Here's Your Government Healthcare

You know the government could have just contracted to a private insurance company to take care of our veterans and they would be better off in most cases. Because the idea that they created a government agency to control costs is laughable. No government agency can control their costs.

'Pushed Aside Like an Animal': Vet Dies While Unable to Get Care Through VA

There are alarming new reports this week about how difficult it has become for veterans to receive medical care from VA hospitals. Reports indicated at least 40 veterans died while awaiting appointments at the Phoenix VA Medical Center, prompting calls for an investigation and Senate hearings from the state's two senators, John McCain and Jeff Flake.
A former doctor alleges that senior management kept a secret waiting list in order to conceal the fact that 1,400 to 1,600 sick veterans were forced to wait months to see a doctor. ~snip~

The examples of malfeasance, incompetence and bias of government civil "servants" have been plain to see for decades. Yet people still voted for a second term of Obama so he could begin to implement another government program that will punish the American people with ever rising taxes and declining accountability.

The Confiscation Continues

Just a little reminder that government is not our friend.

‘Tax Freedom Day’ falls three days later this year

The day when the nation collectively has made enough money to pay its total tax burden for the year is three days later this year, according to a new report.
According to a report released Monday by the Tax Foundation, this year Tax Freedom Day falls 111 days into 2014, on April 21.
By April 21, to group says, Americans will have made enough to pay the $3 trillion in federal taxes and $1.5 trillion in state taxes — more than they will spend on food clothing and housing combined.
Tax Freedom Day is later than it was last year, due in large part to the slow economic recovery, the tax policy research group argues.
“Tax Freedom Day is three days later than last year due mainly to the country’s continued slow economic recovery, which is expected to boost tax revenue especially from the corporate, payroll, and individual income tax,” authors Kyle Pomerleau and Lyman Stone write.~snip~

The liberal/democrats continue to cause the economy to go down in flames and yet continue to confiscate our hard earned money in taxes without a pause.
 

Some AG's Go After E-Cigs

Government just doesn't know when to give up when it comes to inserting itself into our lives.

Although I gotta say selling nicotine products to minors should be illegal but any other interference directed at adults is really just nanny statism.

 AR Atty General: E-Cigs Need to be Regulated Immediately

LITTLE ROCK, AR-- Forty attorneys general from around the U.S. are urging the FDA to impose more regulatory controls on the sale and marketing of e-cigarettes
Namely, restrict advertising and ban the sale of of the product to minors.  In a letter to the Food and Drug Administration, they've ask for an immediate action to treat the electronic cigarettes the same as all "tobacco products" under the Federal Tobacco Control Act.
According to a press release, e-cigarette have been doubling every year since 2008 and, unlike with traditional tobacco products, there are no federal age restrictions to prevent children from obtaining e-cigarettes.
Earlier this year, the Arkansas Legislature enacted Act 1451, which prohibits the sale of e-cigarettes to minors in the State but there is no such federal prohibition.
The letter calls into question the practice of advertising the electronic cigarette with primetime commercials and celebrity endorsements.~snip~

You know they've already taxed traditional cigarettes pretty much out of reach of most low income Americans. The cheapest per pack in this area is around $4.12. Thirty days of that and you're looking at around 124 bucks a month.
Then you got the complaints of second hand smoke and the stale tobacco smell, neither of which e-cigarettes have.
So a lot of people who picked up smoking in the past have switched and the various nicotine "juices" are a lot cheaper than a pack of cigarettes. People can pay around 7 to 8 dollars to supply their habit for around a month.
Quite the cut and it's even cheaper than a ounce of pot where it's legal. But then again the politicians want to tax the hell out that also.
Which is really what it's all about.......taxes.
All stages of government, federal on down, seem to think that they have a right to confiscate as much money has possible from the citizens to do whatever they want with it. Because they're so much smarter than the rest of us.
Maybe e-cigs aren't the best place to draw a line against government taxation and intrusion but there has to come a time when we need to push back.
Because when they're done with what is easy they'll come for other things until they can penalize us all for anything they choose.

Gas Prices and the New Normal

Some good news, gas prices are going down some. The bad news is on average they're about 15 cents more than last year.

Gasoline prices begin summer slide

While analysts are not expecting a resulting surge in gasoline prices, they could rise quickly if the Mideast unrest does disrupt oil supplies. Gas could also climb if a hurricane threatens the heart of the refining industry along the Gulf Coast.
This year's early summer decline, while welcome, is smaller than the seasonal drops of the last two years, when gas prices also fell between Memorial Day and Independence Day. Gasoline is 15 cents more expensive than it was last year at this time.
Gas prices typically rise in late winter or early spring when refineries perform maintenance and switch from making winter gasoline blends to the more complex summer blends required for clean-air rules. When the nation's refineries aren't operating at full strength, supplies drop and prices rise. Once the maintenance is done, output rises and prices fall.
"When refineries go down it can create immediate and severe havoc," Kloza said. "It's a very shallow distribution system, quick to fill and quick to empty."~snip~

There's been a decline in the number of refineries but the ones still operational have been fitted to refine more. But when one goes down it really creates havoc.
On top of the fact that we depend on oil from a region of the world that is, to say the least, pretty unstable. Whatever happens there affects the price of oil here.

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That could be softened by the Keystone XL pipeline that the enviro-nazis are so up in arms about.....aided and abetted by Obama and various commie/democrats of course because whatever might be good for the middle class they're against.
Of course the government, local,state and federal has to have their cut.

Some U.S. drivers will be paying a little more because of higher gasoline taxes that went into effect July 1. California and Maryland taxes rose 3.5 cents per gallon, Connecticut's climbed 4 cents, and Wyoming's 10 cents. Virginia drivers are getting a break — gas taxes there are falling 6.4 cents.
Gasoline taxes account for the biggest difference in pump prices for U.S. drivers. Local, state and federal taxes vary from nearly 70 cents per gallon in New York, California and Hawaii to half that in Missouri, New Jersey, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Virginia, according to the American Petroleum Institute, the industry's chief lobbying group.

Which would be alright if they actually used those taxes for road and highway improvement instead of putting into their general operating fund to spread the wealth around.
There's so many ways gas prices are manipulated to soak the middle class in this country that it's shameful, and we pay the price in higher fuel taxes and the cost of goods and services.
So when you're looking at the price at the pump and thinking you're getting a break paying 15 cents less this week than you were last week, remember how the government is getting richer and pandering to enviro-wackos for political gain and donations to their campaigns, while making you poorer and shortening the distance that a dollar will go just to get you to work and the grocery store.

We work for the government now, not the other way around.

Done Nothing Wrong So I'll Plead the Fifth

Because innocent people refuse to answer questions that may incriminate them.

This is the kind of contempt that the Obama lead IRS has for the citizens it supposedly serves. One thing that everyone forgets is that these are the people who confiscate the fruits of your sweat, labor and intellect with the force of law and a gun if necessary.

The IRS is full of "Lois Lerner" types who suck off the public teat and then abuse their position along with displaying open disdain for the people the are supposed to serve.
Civil service is a stain on our society that should be granted only sparingly and limited in service.
It attracts the least competent and rewards them with perpetual employment on the taxpayers dime.
In other words it's chock full of progressive liberal commies.

Marijuana Goes Mainstream

I'll admit that when I was a very young man I used pot and unlike Bill Clinton I actually inhaled.
Back when you could buy a "nickel" and an ounce cost $10.00.
Smoking pot back then was sort of a revolutionary act a way to stick it to the "man" and throw off the oppression of the government and uptight squares.
Plus I kind of liked getting high.

That was back in the day when love was free, more women where becoming single moms, started exploring food stamps and welfare and divorce became "no fault".

Hardly good social changes.

I'm not saying smoking pot caused these changes but I do know that it can rob people of their ambitions.
I can't tell you the number of times I've sat around listening to people at the time get high and then lay out their entire lifes plan then instead of acting on it all they did the next day was get high again.

But then again that's what being an American is all about, as John Kerry said we do have a right to be stupid.

So it's no surprise that a majority of Americans would poll to support legalizing pot.

Majority Now Supports Legalizing Marijuana

For the first time in more than four decades of polling on the issue, a majority of Americans favor legalizing the use of marijuana. A national survey finds that 52% say that the use of marijuana should be made legal while 45% say it should not.
Support for legalizing marijuana has risen 11 points since 2010. The change is even more dramatic since the late 1960s. A 1969 Gallup survey found that just 12% favored legalizing marijuana use, while 84% were opposed.

Yup, that's right, something that used to be a revolutionary act is going mainstream with the public and you know if it ever does get legalized the federal and state governments are going to tax the shit out of it.
As a matter of fact a lot of them are salivating at the prospect of another revenue stream. The very same governments who have been been crappy stewards of our money as it is.
Because they have been so bad at it before they need new ways to raise taxes so they can piss away even more. Pot will be perfect for them for the simple fact that it will be considered a vice like alcohol or cigarettes so the tax potential will be unlimited.

When pot becomes legal it'll be the governments opportunity to stick it to the users again.
Counter culture going full circle, how ironic will that be?

RINO Rebellion

Well here we go, when people say there isn't a dimes worth of difference between republicans and democrats, basically they're right.
Republicans are just as willing to buy votes as democrats are.

Top Republican Senator ditches Norquist anti-tax pledge

A top Republican senator is casting aside an anti-tax pledge he signed, saying that solving the country’s looming fiscal crisis is more important than honoring the decades-old pact.
Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., broke ranks with other conservatives Wednesday when he made the remarks to a local television station. Chambliss is a member of the Gang of Six, a bipartisan group of senators tasked with finding a solution to the country's fiscal woes.
"I care more about my country than I do about a 20-year-old pledge," he told WMAZ-TV. "If we do it his way then we’ll continue in debt, and I just have a disagreement with him about that."
Congress and the White House face a year-end deadline to reach a deal that staves off an avalanche of tax increases and deep cuts in government programs – commonly referred to now as the “fiscal cliff.”
Chambliss signed the Taxpayer Protection Pledge, authored by conservative activist Grover Norquist and embraced by the majority of congressional Republican lawmakers. In it, Norquist, an anti-tax lobbyist and head of Americans for Tax Reform, does not allow for tax rates to rise.
Those who sign the pledge "solemnly bind themselves to oppose any and all tax increases," according to the group’s website, which states that 39 senators, including Chambliss, and 219 House members support it.
Chambliss acknowledged that distancing himself from the pledge might hurt him in his bid for re-election in 2014, but said he's not.

Republicans....like democrats are all for sacrifice as long as it's someone else. I haven't really heard a whole lot in this debate about cutting out some of the waste and corruption that exists in our federal government.  They're all about raising taxes on others and threatening to cut money from the most vulnerable, Social Security, the military, programs for the poor etc., but I don't hear no talk about cutting back on their salaries or those of civil servants.
Nothing about cutting back on their "Cadillac" insurance plans or even switching over to Obamacare like the rest of us are forced to.
Obama winning a second term has given the RINO's cover to be their true selves and help the democrats tax the country into submission and giving the country a reason to purge more RINO's in 2014.
By then even the idiots who voted for Obama should have had enough....I hope.

Liberal Idiocy

I gotta tell you, I'm just amazed at the moronic logic that libtards use in their arguments.

I ran across this gem on facebook during a discussion on todays SCOTUS ruling on Obamacare.

Liberal idiot quote : if you have taken tax deductions and credits you have depended on the government. If you use any roads you depend on the government. If you stop at a red light you depend on the government. So YES YOU DEPEND ON THE GOVERNMENT

There's so many things wrong with this that it defies explanation but if your a liberal who's tripped across this blog then I'll try and explain it to you.
First off to have the government confiscate your hard earned money and then dribble some of it back to you when it sees fit is not "dependency", it's legalized theft of your sweat and abilities.
The trick is the government should only steal from you the bare minimum it needs to satisfy the functions that the people charge it with.
Like providing safe roads to drive on and safety devices to regulate that traffic.

In a sane world the government is dependant on it's citizens, not the other way around.

Hope that clears it up for you.

For Democrats it's Always About Taking More Money

I don't know why anyone would be surprised that Billy "BJ" Clinton thinks the only way out of Americas fiscal mess is by raising taxes on everyone.

Bill Clinton: Hike taxes across the board

Bill Clinton said Tuesday that President Barack Obama’s goal of hiking taxes on the rich alone is not enough to solve the country’s fiscal woes and suggested that middle class Americans must also eventually contribute more.
Clinton, who discussed a number of economic and political issues at the Peter G. Peterson Foundation’s third annual Fiscal Summit in Washington, D.C., prefaced his comments with the warning that he was giving his personal view and was “not speaking for the White House.”

“This is just me now, I’m not speaking for the White House — I think you could tax me at a 100 percent and you wouldn’t balance the budget,” said Clinton, who has earned tens of millions of dollars since leaving office. “We are all going to have to contribute to this, and if middle class people’s wages were going up again, and we had some growth to the economy, I don’t think they would object to going back to tax rates [from] when I was president” - before the Bush tax cuts.

It's always about the government wanting more money, never about the the way they piss it away on frivolous stuff.
Also, how come when they talk about budget cuts it's always the seniors, the military, emergency services, education and other essential services that are threatened?
They never talk about defunding stuff like the CPB or National endowment for the arts or even the vast bloated, bureaucracy of soulless civil servants who lord their petty little positions over the people who are forced by the rule of law to pay for their over sized salaries.
Hey Bill!
The problem isn't that the government ain't got enough money, it's that they're to irresponsible to be in control of it.