The accomodations tax racket, NC style

We've covered this little monster before, but not, I think, in too many other states than the PN's home base of South Carolina. Extra -- extra -- they're actually calling it what it is for once, a FIFTY-PERCENT hike in this case!

http://www.carolinajournal.com/exclusives/display_exclusive.html?id=11016
JLF Report Critiques Possible 50 Percent Occupancy Tax Hike for Haywood
Proposal calls for county rate of 6 percent, highest in the region

Normally the vermin proposing raising an accommodations gouge refer to it in a cutesy little tone as a "penny" tax increase, which in this case would be a "two penny" gouge. The shock is when conservatives and libertarians ape their oppressors by using the fake "penny" term, around here even pronouncing it "pinny" because it's just so much more cutesy, folksy and homey I suppose. This they do with stunning consistency over decades, famously so here in Anderson, SC where I live.

Every little teensy hike in the cost of anything by our supposed public servants should be fought tooth and nail on principle. There is no such thing as a good, lawful, justifiable tax increase of ANY kind or degree unless a properly informed citizenry has debated it and agreed to it at the ballot box. If there's any chicanery, sneaking, lying, or play-acting by the ones mandating it, that should be a huge red flag.

Can you tell I for one am every bit as concerned about the public's behavior as about tax gouging itself? Calling things by their proper name is the beginning of intelligence. Without it language is ruined, and it takes thought down the sewer hole with it. A people who can't think any better than this are simply doomed. Take it from here, North Carolina!

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