"Invention is continually exercised, to furnish new pretenses for revenues and taxation. It watches prosperity as its prey and permits none to escape without tribute." --Thomas Paine (Rights of Man, 1791)
"Fairness"?
Under cover of the Republican Presidential Primary debates about how to defeat Barack Hussein Obama's socialist agenda and his plan to fund the final chapter of that agenda with enormous tax increases, Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN, no relation!) and Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) have teamed up to promote one of the largest tax increases in U.S. history -- a heavy levy on all Internet sales.
The so-called "Marketplace Fairness Act" S. 1832 was first proposed in November 2011 by Sen. Michael Enzi (R-WY), and now awaits action in the Committee on Finance. (And you thought all that "fairness" rhetoric was limited to leftists promoting Democratic Socialism.)
Some otherwise erudite conservative senators, such as my friend Bob Corker, have joined Alexander in this errant folly. They are backing the Republican version of the legislation because it is allegedly better than the Democrat version. For the record, I do not consider that to be a legitimate selling point.
Before explaining this enormous tax increase, allow me to provide some insights demonstrating how detached Lamar is from marketplace reality and how he became so disoriented.
I once admired Lamar, an affable and intelligent fellow whose successful 1979 gubernatorial campaign trademark was his folksy grassroots plaid shirt. After a couple of terms as governor, he accepted an appointment as Secretary of Education from George H.W. Bush in 1991. In that role, he unfortunately supervised the expansion of that department rather than its contraction as proposed by Bush's former boss, Ronald Reagan.
Predictably, after Lamar's move to Washington, he progressively lost touch with his grassroots base and began a slide into the mediocrity of Republican moderation -- which often renders its adherents ideologically indistinguishable from their Democrat opponents. I diagnose this condition as Chronic Potomac Fever, which infects too many well-meaning Republicans after they take up residence inside the Washington Beltway.
