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Originally Posted by filtherton
Many things can be accomplished without involving the government. Why bring government into anything? Anything is theoretically possible without a government. Why even have a government?
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Because there are some things the gov't can provide that the private sector can't. But, we are gonna go way into left field if we want to go into this one. I am not saying "no government", I am saying "less government".
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Originally Posted by filtherton
I believe that the government exists for whatever purpose the people see fit to use it for within the bounds of the constitution. "Big Government" is a boogeyman. Everyone hates big government until big government can help them.
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I agree.
And banning smoking fits into this equation how?
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Originally Posted by filtherton
How can you claim that we'll never have a "truly balanced budget or decreasing deficits until we stop the growth of gov't"? That assertion is more faith based than anything. See charlatan's post about canada.
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No, it is not.
We consistently spend more than we bring in....way more. We run massive deficits because of this.
How do you fix overspending? Easy, you spend less. How do you spend less? Well, you can start by not wasting gov't time and money on something like this. Is it going to fix the problem? Nope. We need to cut back and quit going overboard in our entire fiscal policy. We need to decrease the scope of the gov't, not increase it. Plus, we need to take a close look at the current programs and see if we can do things more efficiently.
No faith needed on this one.
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Originally Posted by filtherton
Sin taxes do what they're supposed to do. They provide an incentive for people to stop doing certain things. It's the same principal as giving people and corporations tax breaks for doing certain things. It's rewarding people/corporations based on their good behavior, "good" being defined by the people making the laws.
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Anyone who supports this ban, or "sin taxes", doesn't give one shit about the "sinners" they are taxing.
"Sin taxes" are for creating revenue, nothing else.
If your argument were true, they wouldn't have long-term plans to spend this new found money, because the amount of money coming in would dwindle because everyone is now aware of their sin and people start to quit smoking.
Unfortunately, the opposite is true.
Here in Colorado, they just voted in a massive increase to the existing "sin tax" for cigarettes.
Guess how much is earmaked for "smoking cessation"? 16%.
84% of this new tax will be spent elsewhere. As I said, it isn't about cutting down on smokers. They don't want that, they want their money.
I'm sorry, this ban and sin taxes are bullshit, pure and simple.