Pubbies Prepare to Toss Smokers Under the Bus

The drumbeat continues.

Early this week, the Republican Speaker of the Assembly revived DarthDoyle's $1.25-per-pack increase in cigarette taxes.

Now we read this:

...Republicans, who control the Assembly, might not accept the hospital tax, the cigarette tax increase and the one-time transfer from the state fund that helps pay for medical malpractice awards. Thirteen of the 52 Assembly Republicans have said they would not vote for a budget that raises the cigarette tax.

We can assume that the reporter was accurately paraphrasing a conversation held with a member of the budget-negotiations group. Thus, we parse:

"The Republicans who control the Assembly will accept the cigarette tax and the hospital tax. It is not likely that they will accept the raid on the malpractice fund."

There's no threat from smokers which is viable--if the Republicans wish to increase tobacco taxes, they will do so.

We always knew that the urge to Spend Spend Spend (Other People's Money) would never be repressed in the ranks of the Party of Government.

The question: when tobacco tax revenues take a dive (and they will), which group will be the NEXT target?

Owen also notes that despite the headline-and-content-tilt of the cited article, the Republicans have NOT said anything about the tax increase proposals one way or the other.

So the question: exactly who is feeding the article's authors? And what are they feeding them?

And another question: do mushrooms grow where the reporter works?

Finally, Owen also observed what I did in reading the article: Doyle's moving a helluva lot further towards "partial budgets" than anyone would have expected based on his prior statements.

"Flailing," indeed. Not quite "Desperation," but flailing.