That really is chilling -- a shameless money grab wrapped in pandering, do-gooder packaging.
It's no surprise that such a bill, purporting to fund education through a
massive tax increase on all tobacco and nicotine-delivery products*, would come from Democrats. You may very well be right that most of our opposition in government, at this time, has come from the left. But as you say, we can only evaluate each politician's position as it comes up; there's no reason to believe that conservative-leaning officials wouldn't also gravitate to the "for the children" narrative in an albeit different context.
And there's a heavy opposition to vaping in the private sector too. Tobacco companies are largely passive observers at this point as far as I can tell, but their interest clearly aligns with people who would support the above-referenced bill. Big Tobacco is, if you like, a malignant bystander, biding its time, possessed of the resources to profit from almost anything the government/FDA decides to do to the vaping industry. BT may even be actively working against us behind the scenes.
* -
I found the following comment on the popvox website particularly apt. When you read through the bill, it's not entirely obvious what's going on; you can only evaluate the amounts discussed in each item based on their relationship with one another. In fact, in some cases the tax hikes are so huge that the formatting makes them look like a typo -- but this guy sums it up admirably:
"You raised the tax on one of the poorest minority groups in America, those so poor they are forced to roll their own cigarettes daily from shreds of tobacco and scraps of paper, by over TWO THOUSAND PERCENT with the SCHIP tax just three years ago. And now you want to add another 2,000%+ over 2008's base rate tax on TOP of that?
Do you remember the huge stink that was made years ago when Congress wanted to raise the tax on YACHTS by just 10%? And yet you're considering a tax that would result in over a 4,000% increase in just four years on poor people? You should be royally ashamed of yourselves.
Michael J. McFadden
Author of "Dissecting Antismokers' Brains"
Philadelphia, PA"
