Spitzer wants N.Y. to tax illegal drugs

The San Francisco Chronicle reports on addiction:

If you can't beat it, tax it.

That seems to be the axiom in New York these days, where Democratic Gov. Eliot Spitzer, struggling to close a $4.4 billion budget gap, has proposed making drug dealers pay tax on their stashes of illegal drugs. The new tax would apply to cocaine, heroin and marijuana, and could be paid with pre-bought "tax stamps" affixed to the bags of dope.

Some critics in the legislature are asking what the governor has been smoking.

"I guess if it moves, he'll tax it," said Republican state Sen. Martin Golden, who dubbed the proposal "the crack tax." Some opponents said that because cocaine and marijuana would be subject to the new levies, it should more aptly be called "the crack-pot tax."

"How do I explain to my 16-year-old son that we're giving a certain legitimacy to marijuana, cocaine and heroin?" asked Golden, a former New York City police officer who represents a Brooklyn district. "We are taxing an illegal substance." He added, "Is prostitution next?"

On the other side of the aisle, some Democrats, too, were stunned by the plan. "My initial instinct is: I don't understand it," said Bill Perkins, a state senator from Harlem. "Most of the dealers I'm familiar with are petty crack dealers - most of them are crackheads. They are broke, to say the least. I just don't understand how you impose a tax" on broke crackheads, he said.

The most dangerous addicts in society are those who vote on government spending.Their addiction to taking campaign funds from rent-seeking groups makes them a menace to society.No word yet a a 12 step recovery process for them.