|
|
THANKSGIVING WITHOUT TAXES
|
|
|
I’m already wishing I hadn’t written this. I know that it’s a piece that
rises from my feelings more than my thoughts. At any rate I want to try
to put some thoughts with my feelings. |
My feelings were stirred by a Thanksgiving Day article about smoking:
| “Nearly half
of all cigarettes purchased in the United States are smoked by people
who suffer from mental illness.” (Harvard Medical School) |
|
|
My brain whirled into a free-association mode. In most states a common
way of increasing revenue for schools and social services is to add to
the cigarette tax. We tax cigarettes so we won’t have to add to taxes of
higher wage earners and corporations or property owners. |
|
The “sin taxes,” on cigarettes, alcohol and gambling keep the public schools,
universities and social services from further financial erosion. |
|
So, now we see who half of these “sin-taxers” are. They are the mentally
ill, most of whom are in low or no income status. |
|
How humiliating it must be for teachers and professors and social workers
to realize that their jobs are dependent on mentally ill smokers. |
|
How frightening to think what might happen if we actually got people to
stop smoking. Someone else would have to pick up lost revenue. |
|
My mind rambles onward. I’m thinking how we have made a relentless assault
on treatment programs for the mentally ill. They are forced into community
programs ill-prepared to care for and treat them. Their illnesses are often
criminalized. I’m not sure of the actual data, but I overheard the head
of our prison system (remember, we were picking grapes at a winery at time)
guess that at least a third of prisoners could be listed as mentally ill.
So being mentally ill is a crime in Oregon. It’s that way everywhere. |
Back to Holland—I forgot that you weren’t there—where a tour guide reminded
us not to be offended by open use of marijuana. She said:
| "We look at drug problems
differently than you. For us it is not a crime problem but a health problem.
We offer treatment rather than prison." |
|
| (Note the rolling of eyes
of our group of white, middle (and upper) class citizens of the land of
liberty and justice for all. Doesn’t she realize that if we cure these
people we can’t tax their vices?) |
|
|
I’m trying to think whether there is anyone I haven’t already offended. |
|
I hope I am not making anyone suspicious about friends who smoke. The “good”
smokers are in trouble enough. We’ve closed them out of all public places
in our town. We know not what we do, do we? I mean, we’re at risk of losing
those cigarette taxes, don’t we realize? We may be denying comfort to the
mentally ill who don’t have money (or motivation) for prescribed drugs,
so compensate with high priced cigarettes. |
|
So, I’m thinking that when Squanto (or whoever it was) passed the pipe
around after the first Thanksgiving, he was beginning to get even for the
germ warfare and ethnic cleansing the white guys were inflicting on the
red guys. He was starting an epidemic of mental illness for the white man
to tax. This paved the way for opening of casinos so the Indians could
capitalize on the white man’s desire to get something for nothing by taxing
gambling. God bless America, but don’t make us pay for it. Let’s shift
that responsibility to those who smoke (or gamble or drink). |
Now I see why I didn’t want to write this. A mind in free association may
be a mind in free fall. Maybe I need a cigarette. It might not be good
for me, but it’s good for America!
Art Morgan
– Thanksgiving 2000 (Published 1/15/2001)
|