[teslahelper]

CALL Sad Obama, he promised no taxes and then taxed smokers. He said no special interests and then helps Big Pharm? Bad Obama at the Whitehouse comment phone number, a person really answers. 202-456-1111

This is why I DIDNT vote for this joker: He's a liar! He signed S-chip w/o looking at it first and he wants to bail out drug companies (yeah right, like they need it). Thanks Mr. President ...we got to put up with 47 more months with this joker! I consider him a hippocrite since he is a smoker. I guess when you start getting that presidential income and you are still smoking, you don't have to worry about having the money to pay for the sky high cig prices!

[Max]

If we all make an effort, we could actually get our voices heard. I'm in.

[cooljay788]

It's good to see I'm not alone in calling Obama a liar when he promised to neva raise taxes. A related topic on calling Obama is in this week's smokers rights newsletter.

[bobbyT]

1. Federal Tax Increase on Tobacco (SCHIP)

On January 9th C.L.A.S.H. alerted you to an upcoming vote in Congress to reauthorize the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) that would raise the federal tax on all forms of tobacco to fund it. C.L.A.S.H., joined by other smokers' rights groups, issued a press release opposing this further victimization of smokers.

Despite efforts by a number of organizations to thwart it, both houses approved it and President Obama signed Bill H.R. 2 into law on February 4th. The following increases -- all higher than originally proposed! -- are effective April 1, 2009:

Cigars from 20.719% to 52.75% per 1000 over 3 lbs with a 40.26 cents per cigar cap (+155%)
Little cigars from 4.0 cents to $1.00 per pack (+2,400%);
Cigarettes from 39 cents to $1.01 per pack (+159%)
(increase of 1 cent from original bill);
Cigarette papers from 1.22 cents to 3.15 cents per 50 (+158%)
(increase of 2 cents from original bill);
Cigarette tubes from 2.44 cents to 6.30 cents per 50 (+158%)
(increase of 4 cents from original bill);
Snuff from 58.5 cents to $1.51 per pound (+158%)
(increase of 1 cent from original bill);
Chewing tobacco from 19.5 cents to 50.33 cents per pound (+158%)
(increase of 0.33 cents from original bill);
Pipe tobacco from $1.0969 to $2.8126 per pound (+156%)
(increase of 0.0185 cents from original bill); and
Roll-your-own tobacco from $1.0969 to $24.78 per pound (+2159%)
(previous C.L.A.S.H. report of $8.889 was in error based on 2008 Bill. Original Bill for 2009 was $24.62 for a final Bill increase of 16 cents for a total increase of 23.68 DOLLARS).

[Rodwy]

That increase on rolling tobacco is going to increase the price per 1.3 oz bag by about 2 dollars. So much for buying Bali when I get cheap.

[bobbyT]

no politician is going to get thrown out of office for raising taxes on us smokers...mind you, we're addicted to a legal drug mechanism which they al helped to create and support. Everyone is in on it. The manufacturers, the distributors, the traditional retailers all stand to lose substantially from online delivery alternatives with bona ide native american business conducting their operations from sovereign land. this battle will continue, but the fact is, this issue won't happen overnight and it will result in some form of compomise...my advice, find a good quality 4tht tier brand with which you are comfortable like Kingsley and see if it doesn't change your mind about the cost per stick....Kingsley retails for $11-$14 a carton depending from which online retailer you're buying it from, but he studied the manufacturing process of the big boys and he has developed a high quality affordable smoke with excellent packaging. try it for yourself and see, but the writing is on the wall, no politician is going to get thrown out of office for raising tobacco taxes and if you are like me, 1/4 of the u.S. population are smokers and i don't want my kids to smoke, but i also don't want our constitution to become a slippery slope. When Amercian engenuity has figured out a more direct delivery model to smokers everywhere domestically, the simple answer is this: force the to collect a nominal tax since they are sovereign tax since they are SOVEREIGN entities, albeit lower than traditional convenience store sales and everyone will live happily ever after...just my two cents,

[jlong]

Obama reminds me of an overly confident evangilist who thinks he has all the answers when really, he's going at his job blindly. This is just a cheap, easy, brainless way to raise tax because A) we are addicted and B) non-smokers won't have to pay it and vote yes.

If they continue to raise tobacco taxes the way they have been, it will get to the point smokers will be supporting society and non-smokers will be the bums of society. Is that what non-smokers want???

If this is their thinking, why not legalize pot and charge $100 an ounce? A lot of people would gladly pay that and they could raise cash fast.

[smokybear]

absolutely they should legalize soft drugs like marijuana and tax it...otherwise, they will just stick it to the cigarette smokers repeatedly...

[CamelMan324]

Originally Posted by teslahelper CALL Sad Obama, he promised no taxes and then taxed smokers. He said no special interests and then helps Big Pharm? Bad Obama at the Whitehouse comment phone number, a person really answers. 202-456-1111 This is why I DIDNT vote for this joker: He's a liar! He signed S-chip w/o looking at it first and he wants to bail out drug companies (yeah right, like they need it). Thanks Mr. President ...we got to put up with 47 more months with this joker! I consider him a hippocrite since he is a smoker. I guess when you start getting that presidential income and you are still smoking, you don't have to worry about having the money to pay for the sky high cig prices!

Yes, I know, this pisses me off the most. Ok, so they ban smoking in bars, restaraunts, subways, buses, etc. Ok, so I can tolerate that, but now they wanna screw with the prices on us? That's just crap, I think smokers need to start acting, and stop sitting on the sidelines and complaining about it.

"Oh, let's jack the prices up because it will stop kids from starting and it will make adults want to quit"- what a crock of crap. I love how all of these non-smoking advocate morons love to bitch about smoking, but don't mention anything about alcohol???

In my opinion, I think alcohol should be the thing that should be getting taxed like this, not cigs. I'm almost tempted to just start growing my own damn tobacco in my backyard and just smoking what I grow myself, because I am literally not going to sit here and watch myself get taken advantage of by these left-wing idiots

[Sally]

He is nothing more than a puppet on a string. But let’s go ahead and blame all of our problems on the little black puppet in office. Sheesh next we will be blaming the little green puppet on the string next go around. You think?