Merry F'n' Christmas: Obama Administration Proposes Tax on Christmas Trees

It's a small tax, fifteen cents per tree.

So what? What possible justification is there for taxing Christmas trees?

Here's their justification:

The Obama administration has imposed a 15-cent tax on Christmas trees in order to pay for a new board tasked with promoting the Christmas tree industry.

We need to promote this industry?

Here's a good question. The tax will be imposed on sellers of Christmas trees, who will in turn collect it from buyers of Christmas trees.

So, the tax is taken from buyers of Christmas trees to promote to them the idea that they should buy Christmas trees.

We now need the federal government to impose a tax, and make a purchase slightly less beneficial for the user (by making it more costly) in order to... tell him he did a good thing in making the purchase?

As Instapundit used to say, "Gee, I'm so glad the government has every other duty squared away that it can now go looking for new dragons to slay!"

On Twitter, I asked, "What new rent-seeker are we now obligated to provide a fat lifestyle to in perpetuity?"

Here's the answer:

The board, proposed earlier this year, is the culmination of a years-long effort by the fresh Christmas tree industry to promote itself, according to the background provided in the Federal Register. The industry has faced increasing competition from producers of artificial trees, but efforts to collect voluntary contributions for a fresh-tree marketing campaign have repeatedly run out of funding. So the government stepped in to mandate a fee to support the promotion board.

I oppose this with all the bitterness in my black heart.

Fend for yourselves, assholes. You want to run an advertising campaign? God love ya. Do it with your own damn money.

No. A thousand times No. It is a time for a serious rollback of Uncle Sugar, not an expansion of Uncle Sugar into more and varied Venture Socialism opportunities.

I love fresh Christmas trees.

That's not the point.

It is not the federal government's job to now add to its list of responsibilities (and powers) taxing citizens to encourage them to buy the thing they already bought. It is not their job to tell people that fresh trees are better than artificial ones.

Everyone goes to Washington with their hands out.

It is the duty of Washington to begin telling people:

This is America. People work for a living here. The Free Money Shop is closed due to their being too much interest in it.

posted by Ace at 01:09 PM

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