In four years we would remeber this when the DOW is at 4000 and our tax rates are up 50%. We won't remember this because we will think the Carter era was a fun time because inflation was only 20% and unemployment only 10%.

Wait till they atrt taxing gasoline out of your tanks and add new taxes for electricity. Wait till they tax dividends at a rate that will have people putting their money in the backyard.

Cahnge, hope, unicorns.

Die fahnan hoch!

Yeah NewPres is just getting started. And the cig tax is such hypocrisy. They say the tax is to encourage people to quit, yet their budgets operate on the HOPE that we don't CHANGE our ways, and continue to smoke. They need the money.

ALL POLITICIANS SUCK.

I'm going out for a smoke.

I'm a smoker and not particularly proud of that fact. I honestly believe it's more a case of my being obstinate rather than addicted. I hate stop smoking campaigns and every time a doctor tells me I should quit I want to jam my thumb in his eye. Still, of all the reasons to quit, paying an extra 61 cents per pack will likely be the one that makes it happen.

My point is, if other smokers view this the same way I do, where will the funding come from once we start quitting or cutting way down? It's absolutely ridiculous to fund a program that has ever-increasing costs and recipients with a source that the government itself is funding separate programs to eliminate and will likely diminish on its own due to the high cost.

How about the government pull all the funding from smoking cessation programs and apply it to the SCHIP?

I was going to post a "having a dose of reality" post at DU but it seems they revoked my posting privileges (as i expected) for having a good question about open dialogue without personal attacks...which the DUers replies obviously didn't follow. So i got banned for their idiocy...lol.

If they can't take this first tax hike that site's going to have an a "collectivist" heart attack before Obama's into his second year. Seems the post-9/11 "it's Bush's fault political geniuses" are finding out they know less than they thought and maybe the doses of reality will teach them not to put blind faith in politicians. Now they too are experiencing the change they voted for.

They'll be having second thoughts about how bad they thought George Bush was by the time Barack's done.

Don't they know raising the prices of cigarettes is a part of environmentalism and going green. Cigarette smoke contains pollutants and that evil tobacco plant is enslaving tobacco farmers when they could be collecting money from their governments for nothing!

In the UK we pay £5 ++ for a packet of "fags". Most of that is tax and some say its what gives us our free health care. Im a smoker and i know id rather have health care than not.

I quit smoking. Doesn't bother me. :P

On a serious note:

I live in Canada, and health care is free (sometimes low-quality, with long waits, but free). For my country I'd be all in favour of high taxes on cigarettes, to put that money into taking care of those people who will get lung cancer later. In canada we pay about $6~$9 a pack, which is about $5~7 US dollars. Is that higher than in the USA?

It's simple folks. If all undesirable habits - most of all smoking - are given up where are the tax revenues to come from?

The next product is alcohol. Damn. No smoking, no drinking... next? No eating fatty food? Next?... sugar? Next"... protein?

Obesity - even just being a little overweight according to exceedingly small standards is next. I'll be dead by then, no doubt saving hundreds of thousands of dollars in healthcare costs.

A country cannot tax itself to good health. The better the health, the less the tax, the worse the health. Is logic not taught anywhere these days?

Thankfully big changes in healthcare are around the corner.

No, not the stupid single-payer system Obama wants.

Personal genomics is going to radically alter the way medicine is practiced. If everyone knows their genetic predispositions at birth, it will make whatever turkey of a socialized medicine they force on us easier to swallow -- specifically, it should reduce expenditures on expensive and sometimes redundant tests which suck up a lot of health care payment dollars these days.

All the asshole politicians can do is make the system worse, more inefficient and infected by political considerations.

The personal genomics industry will (hopefully) save us.

This is even more of an eye-roller since the Stimulus Bill contains a $75 million line item for "smoking cessation activities."

Why do Democrats want to spend money we don't have on a program that will damage the primary revenue source for children's health care?

Another thought -- someone should keep an eye on the President and any other high-profile smokers in the government. Are they getting their cigarettes locally in DC, or having them shipped in from a low tax/no tax zone like an Indian reservation?

BTW, the state of New York is trying to tax cigarettes sold on Indian reservations to "non-Indians," but a state Supreme Court judge has blocked the law, stating that it violates tribal sovereignty.

Psychiatrist Dr. Daniel Feldman sez:

'The irrational lashing out at President Obama since his inauguration is best explained as a manifestation of frustration felt by supporters of George Bush and his administration. Followers were strongly discouraged (both literally and subconsciously) from expressing any criticism of Mr. Bush, his policies, and actions for fear of being labelled insufficiently unpatriotic or not being a team player. The floodgates were opened when Mr. Obama took office.'

..I live in Canada, and health care is free (sometimes low-quality, with long waits, but free)...

Free? Really? You mean the doctors and hospitals donate their time and resourses and don't get paid? You mean they don't get any money from the Canadian gov't? You mean no one in Canada pays for or is taxed for health care?

Is that what you mean by 'free'?

Has Brocko even made a speech about the horrible plight of people in Kentucky or flew in a helicopter over the disaster zone? No? You mean he was feasting on a lavish Superbowl party while people froze to death? You mean he and Michele snuck out of the White House to read 'My Pet Gloat' to 2nd-graders after just two weeks on the job?

Heckuva job, Baracky!

LOL AB. Great satirical post. It was tongue in cheek, right?

I love it when the non-smokers say "I don't smoke so I don't care", that's exactly the mentality these jokers are counting on. Something tells me those people will care when the smokers run out and they come for your money next.

Obama lied and raised taxes on the poor.

Hilarious comment from Adrian Brown. First, the criticism of Obama is far from "irrational." Unless you consider it irrational to oppose adding a trillion dollars to the national debt during a recession, or oppose a tax evader as treasury secretary or oppose an administration full of lobbyists.

What makes it even more laughable is that the shrink's comment doesn't explain why all the DUmmies are against the new Obama tax hike to fund children's healthcare. Those at DU are definitely not people who were afraid to criticize Bush for eight years for fear of being thought unpatriotic.

Sounds to me like extreme desperation and an effort to smoke screen the true reasons for criticism of The One. Hint: it isn't some deep pent up frustration resulting in the need to criticize a president -- it's the policies stupid. And the nominations. And the already broken promises. It isn't really all that complicated or difficult to understand.

"The irrational lashing out at President Obama since his inauguration [snip]'

First journalists, then climatologists, now psychologists -- nothing but partisan hacks.

No no no you did not read the entire piece of legislation. About the increase in cigarette tax - Newport and Kool brands will be exempt so as to not offend or inconvenience low-income colored smokers.

Feel better now?

Adrian Browne,

In other words any criticism of Obama is all Bush's fault. It seems the liberal mind needs many layers of defense to keep reality from crashing in. In this case, the reality that Obama is just a man with little experience and few new ideas.

"Unless you consider it irrational to oppose adding a trillion dollars to the national debt during a recession."

That's just the deer-in-the-headlights-thing.

The irrational lashing out at Sarah Palin since President Obama's inauguration is best explained as a manifestation of frustration felt by supporters of Barack Obama and his administration. Followers were strongly encouraged (both literally and subconsciously) from expressing hatred of Mr. Bush, his policies, and actions. The end of his presidency has created a void for the expression of such emotions which must now be redirected onto another Republican.

There, Adrian, fixed it for ya. See how much fun it is?

"from expressing" = "to express"