Screwing Smokers

Most people have probably forgotten about this dandy of a tax increase, but it takes effect today...and if you're a smoker, you're going to notice the heck out of it!

Remember S-CHIP?

A refresher:

Pretty great, huh? Only Congress would think of something so bass-ackwards as providing health care to children by paying for a massive tax increase on smoking. It's a $.62 per pack increase, but that only covers the initial roll-out phase. Once we get down the road a bit, even that tax hike will fall short of funding the program, so they'll have to either trim the health care rolls or recruit more smokers.

I bet we can all guess which will happen.

Extra fun facts about S-CHIP:
- Obama signed the bill just hours after it had been finished, violating his campaign promise to post all legislation online for several days before signing it...you know, for transparency and all that.
- 96% of all smokers earn less than $150,000 a year, making S-CHIP effectively a tax on the poor, and also violating his campaign promise not to raise taxes on anyone earning less than $250,000.

But now there's an extra sucker punch thrown in - once universal health care gets implemented, we know (from looking at EVERY other nation that has tried it) that medical treatments will be limited by the government, and guess who will be the first ones denied? Yep, smokers. After all, smoking is sooooo unhealthy, you know.

There's my two cents.