Washington is surfing for more ways to squeeze more dollars out of us? That's not news...but when it comes to raiding my humidor it's time for action!
Disclaimer: I smoke an occasional cigar.
My wife absolutely hates it and won't let me in the house with one lit, barely one cut and ready to go. She did buy me a very nice humidor for Christmas but filling it up with stogies is up to me and she never misses the chance to remind me it is a dirty, filthy, awful habit bound to lead to mouth cancer, lip cancer, lung cancer and just-plain-cancer.
But ever since the Silva twins and I started puffing away on then-much-cheaper cigars during basement poker games while my reformed-smoker father looked the other way, it has been one of those lifestyle habits I cherish. I've given up just about every other hurtful habit but relaxing on the deck with burning rope after a satisfying steak is safe harbor, one of the last vestiges this aging scoundrel is still permitted.
Until now, that is, when the folks at Thompson Cigar forwarded this article from TampaBay.com alerting cigar aficionados to the threat of politicians in Washington -- hell, those are the guys who CREATED the cigar-smoke filled room image of power and prestige -- raising the ridiculously low cigar tax from five cents a puro to as high as ten bucks.
$10 apiece? What are we smoking, gasoline?
It would be a tax hike of more than two thousand percent...a 2000% increase, something even oil companies cannot image. But to the eager-to-pillage political class in Washington, damn the torpedo, let's roll on those rolled stogies!
Thompson Cigar and just about everyone else associated with the pleasure of firing up a piece of rope these days express outrage and demand cigar fans call their U.S. Senators and demand this foolishness be abandoned. Light up those phone lines, stop the $10 tax!
Here's what will happen, though: the $10 max tax is really a brilliant political move, because who in their right mind really wants to defend just five cents on each $20 cigar? Raising any tax is always easier when you aim high and settle for mid-range, and that's what will happen here.
Cigar taxes will be pushed to the normal range (although still not as much as what cigarette smokers pay), health advocates will feel more satisfied they've been able to carve out a chunk of big tobacco to fund their favorite boondoggle, and cigar smokers will still pay for their favorite stogies while apologizing to their wives, family and lovers and promising the smoke will stay outside.
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