Minnesota's DFL Smokers Should Sit Out The Next Election
In 2010, then DFL gubernatorial candidate Mark Dayton specifically campaigned to Minnesota voters against raising the cigarette tax. It was a refreshing change from the emissary of a political party that has allowed itself to become the party of lifestyle micromanagement, censuring the mostly working-class participants of lifestyles that it decrees to be "sinful" and generally making both asses and frauds of themselves while doing so. With that in mind, the scores of thousands of Minnesota smokers who voted for Dayton in the last election must feel like he's the Brutus to their Julius Caesar right now, as the man who not so long ago passionately opposed cigarette taxes has just championed and then signed the largest cigarette tax increase in American history. And he did so without any public hearing on the pros and cons of such a consequential change in policy, treating smokers without any dignity whatsoever.
I don't even smoke but I am truly sick about this, not only because Minnesota's tax system just got a whole bunch more regressive at the hands of the party whose narrow mandate last year was to tax the rich, but because they show absolutely no signs of ever reining in this impulse to "civilize the savages" into government-approved lifestyles, usually based on the entirely fictional premise that those who indulge in these renegade lifestyles run up higher health care costs. The Republicans insisted that you don't get to have a welfare state without losing your freedoms, and the Democrats are determined to make a self-fulfilling prophesy about this. As the Democrats continue to embrace paternalism to the point of making New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg their David Koresh, they are gonna lose me. Not to the Republicans as the GOP is becoming more untenable as a reasonable governing party with each passing year, but losing me to apathy and resignation that there is nobody in public office whose endgame isn't imposing additional hardship on the already-suffering working class.
Many on the left cannot understand my fury on this issue and can't believe I'd abandon the Democratic Party over something like cigarette taxes, but the issue is a genuine bellwether on a number of metrics and the Democrats' embrace of the issue makes them look increasingly like frauds, predators, and bullies. This is the party that preaches progressive taxes but their path-of-least-resistance revenue-raiser always seems to be the cigarette tax which is far and away the most regressive tax ever imagined, growing only more regressive with each year that smoking is reduced to a downscale pastime. This is the party that preaches tolerance but twists themselves into pretzels to justify why they shame and dehumanize smokers every opportunity they get despite having the pedigree of the Democrats' base...or alleged base. This is the party that preaches secularism yet channels James Dobson and Pat Robertson with its moralistic embrace of "sin" taxes. This is the party the preaches responsible budgeting yet mortgages its budgets at every level of government on artificially overpriced cigarettes even as consumption rates plummet. And this is the party that rightfully bemoans the needless criminal culture created by aggressive drug laws as it applies to marijuana, yet are inching ever closer to a de facto prohibition on cigarettes in which the tobacco black market, indisputably controlled by some of the shadiest characters on American soil, is growing with each passing day. And perhaps worst of all, the template used to humiliate and bankrupt smokers is clearly on the cusp of expanding to all manner of additional "naughty" consumer products, with politicians lying in wait for the years of brainwashing to produce a political climate where they can take on "Big Pop", "Big Fast Food", "Big Ice Cream", "Big Girl Scout Cookies" and whatever other bogeymen they can dream up....all taking the form of usage restrictions and higher regressive taxes levied on the peasantry.
For the past decade or so, ever since this war on smokers began to take its current form, I've held my nose and voted for Democrats despite my growing misgivings and their escalating shrillness on the issue. But I think I've crossed the tipping point with Dayton's additional $1,000+ per year mugging of low-income workers, abuse victims, and the mentally ill to bankroll a professional sports stadium for millionaires and billionaires. My previous assumption was that even with its arrogant and paternalistic assault on smokers (and other naughty pastimes of the poor whose paternalistic assault is right around the corner), the Democratic Party still represented a net positive for these voters in comparison to the monsters on the other side raging about the "47% of Americans dependent upon the government". But as Obama calls for yet another huge cigarette tax increase of his own to pay for universal preschool, it's become clear that whatever benefits the poor would otherwise face by voting Democratic are being canceled out by the party's regressive and ethically monstrous financial censure on their lifestyles. "Sin taxes" have officially become the left's version of "47% of Americans dependent upon the government", and the premise is no closer to reality on the issue for which the Democrats have become agents of intolerance than it was for the fund-raising dinner full of multimillionaires that Mitt Romney was addressing last year.
As I said before, the Republicans are not an option and don't show any signs of being an option in the foreseeable future, so that means the only hope for genuinely progressive minded voters (and for persecuted smokers specifically) is to teach the Democratic Party a hard lesson. Until this paternalistic beast roaring inside the Democratic Party is tamed, they will continue to kick us in the crotch with these cynical schemes. This is why I am calling for the organization of a group vowing to sit out the 2014 election in protest of Minnesota Democrats' intolerable governing philosophy. The title "DFL Smokers Sitting Out The Next Election" has a certain ring to it, and the name itself should be enough to give Minnesota Democrats' heartburn. Maybe, just maybe, if an organized group of smokers (and their sympathizers) can embark on a media push to let the Democrats know that they won't be returning to the open arms of their unreformed abusers this time, the message will finally get through that pissing on smokers every time you win an election comes with political consequences. And if they are well organized, smokers can rightfully claim the scalps of fallen DFL lawmakers in a way unambiguous enough to make this message resonate.
Just think of how narrow the DFL's mandate was in Minnesota, both with Governor Dayton's 7,000-vote victory and with the majority in the legislature achieved by breathtakingly close margins in more than a dozen Senate and House seats that happened to swing the Democrats' way. If even 25% of Democratic-leaning smokers sat out the 2014 election, just think of the mischief they could create. The Senate isn't up next year, but Dayton and the DFL majority in the House would be long gone, most likely along with a couple DFL constitutional office holders statewide like Mark Ritchie and Rebecca Otto, and possibly even Senator Al Franken. Given how much I fear the Republicans, I don't advocate this lightly, but since Democrats are making it obvious that they will perceive every election they win this millennium, no matter how narrow, as a mandate to impose massive financial and psychological hardship on the state's most vulnerable residents and their families based on their lifestyles, they need to be punished for this.....punished with the kind of prejudice that will make them think twice about their party's direction moving forward.
Anybody who reads this and thinks it's a good idea should e-mail me or comment on this thread and I will be more than happy to help you with any organizational ideas from across state lines. I really hope Minnesota smokers have enough self-respect not to let the DFL get away with this.
I don't even smoke but I am truly sick about this, not only because Minnesota's tax system just got a whole bunch more regressive at the hands of the party whose narrow mandate last year was to tax the rich, but because they show absolutely no signs of ever reining in this impulse to "civilize the savages" into government-approved lifestyles, usually based on the entirely fictional premise that those who indulge in these renegade lifestyles run up higher health care costs. The Republicans insisted that you don't get to have a welfare state without losing your freedoms, and the Democrats are determined to make a self-fulfilling prophesy about this. As the Democrats continue to embrace paternalism to the point of making New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg their David Koresh, they are gonna lose me. Not to the Republicans as the GOP is becoming more untenable as a reasonable governing party with each passing year, but losing me to apathy and resignation that there is nobody in public office whose endgame isn't imposing additional hardship on the already-suffering working class.
Many on the left cannot understand my fury on this issue and can't believe I'd abandon the Democratic Party over something like cigarette taxes, but the issue is a genuine bellwether on a number of metrics and the Democrats' embrace of the issue makes them look increasingly like frauds, predators, and bullies. This is the party that preaches progressive taxes but their path-of-least-resistance revenue-raiser always seems to be the cigarette tax which is far and away the most regressive tax ever imagined, growing only more regressive with each year that smoking is reduced to a downscale pastime. This is the party that preaches tolerance but twists themselves into pretzels to justify why they shame and dehumanize smokers every opportunity they get despite having the pedigree of the Democrats' base...or alleged base. This is the party that preaches secularism yet channels James Dobson and Pat Robertson with its moralistic embrace of "sin" taxes. This is the party the preaches responsible budgeting yet mortgages its budgets at every level of government on artificially overpriced cigarettes even as consumption rates plummet. And this is the party that rightfully bemoans the needless criminal culture created by aggressive drug laws as it applies to marijuana, yet are inching ever closer to a de facto prohibition on cigarettes in which the tobacco black market, indisputably controlled by some of the shadiest characters on American soil, is growing with each passing day. And perhaps worst of all, the template used to humiliate and bankrupt smokers is clearly on the cusp of expanding to all manner of additional "naughty" consumer products, with politicians lying in wait for the years of brainwashing to produce a political climate where they can take on "Big Pop", "Big Fast Food", "Big Ice Cream", "Big Girl Scout Cookies" and whatever other bogeymen they can dream up....all taking the form of usage restrictions and higher regressive taxes levied on the peasantry.
For the past decade or so, ever since this war on smokers began to take its current form, I've held my nose and voted for Democrats despite my growing misgivings and their escalating shrillness on the issue. But I think I've crossed the tipping point with Dayton's additional $1,000+ per year mugging of low-income workers, abuse victims, and the mentally ill to bankroll a professional sports stadium for millionaires and billionaires. My previous assumption was that even with its arrogant and paternalistic assault on smokers (and other naughty pastimes of the poor whose paternalistic assault is right around the corner), the Democratic Party still represented a net positive for these voters in comparison to the monsters on the other side raging about the "47% of Americans dependent upon the government". But as Obama calls for yet another huge cigarette tax increase of his own to pay for universal preschool, it's become clear that whatever benefits the poor would otherwise face by voting Democratic are being canceled out by the party's regressive and ethically monstrous financial censure on their lifestyles. "Sin taxes" have officially become the left's version of "47% of Americans dependent upon the government", and the premise is no closer to reality on the issue for which the Democrats have become agents of intolerance than it was for the fund-raising dinner full of multimillionaires that Mitt Romney was addressing last year.
As I said before, the Republicans are not an option and don't show any signs of being an option in the foreseeable future, so that means the only hope for genuinely progressive minded voters (and for persecuted smokers specifically) is to teach the Democratic Party a hard lesson. Until this paternalistic beast roaring inside the Democratic Party is tamed, they will continue to kick us in the crotch with these cynical schemes. This is why I am calling for the organization of a group vowing to sit out the 2014 election in protest of Minnesota Democrats' intolerable governing philosophy. The title "DFL Smokers Sitting Out The Next Election" has a certain ring to it, and the name itself should be enough to give Minnesota Democrats' heartburn. Maybe, just maybe, if an organized group of smokers (and their sympathizers) can embark on a media push to let the Democrats know that they won't be returning to the open arms of their unreformed abusers this time, the message will finally get through that pissing on smokers every time you win an election comes with political consequences. And if they are well organized, smokers can rightfully claim the scalps of fallen DFL lawmakers in a way unambiguous enough to make this message resonate.
Just think of how narrow the DFL's mandate was in Minnesota, both with Governor Dayton's 7,000-vote victory and with the majority in the legislature achieved by breathtakingly close margins in more than a dozen Senate and House seats that happened to swing the Democrats' way. If even 25% of Democratic-leaning smokers sat out the 2014 election, just think of the mischief they could create. The Senate isn't up next year, but Dayton and the DFL majority in the House would be long gone, most likely along with a couple DFL constitutional office holders statewide like Mark Ritchie and Rebecca Otto, and possibly even Senator Al Franken. Given how much I fear the Republicans, I don't advocate this lightly, but since Democrats are making it obvious that they will perceive every election they win this millennium, no matter how narrow, as a mandate to impose massive financial and psychological hardship on the state's most vulnerable residents and their families based on their lifestyles, they need to be punished for this.....punished with the kind of prejudice that will make them think twice about their party's direction moving forward.
Anybody who reads this and thinks it's a good idea should e-mail me or comment on this thread and I will be more than happy to help you with any organizational ideas from across state lines. I really hope Minnesota smokers have enough self-respect not to let the DFL get away with this.
posted by Mark at 12:06 PM
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