-By Vince Johnson
I will get right to the point. America needs a special excise tax levied on all Political Ads. This could be a source for millions in expense required to cover the preparing, printing and distribution of voter’s pamphlets and ballots. It could also help offset expenditures involved with manning and operation of voting booths as well as the expense of clearing up and recycling millions and millions of political signs, buttons, banners, and campaign trash scattered all over America.
My rationale for this tax is simple and based upon the fact that ads can be divided into two categories:
1. Ads focused upon the consumers. These ads are designed to persuade a consumer to buy a specific product or service. Any ad in this category that is misleading or false, is in violation of several different laws designed to protect the consumer. This is fair because the consumers are entitled to base their buying decision upon reliable facts and allows the consumer timely recourse if the ad is misleading. (Suing for damages resulting from false ad claims can be initiated within a few days.)
2. Ads focused upon the voters. These ads are designed to persuade citizens to vote for a specific candidate or referendum. Any ad in this category that is misleading or false is not in violation of any law designed to protect the voters. This is NOT fair because all citizens are entitled to base their voting decisions upon reliable facts and the voter does not have timely recourse if the ad was misleading. (The only remedial action open to the voter involves a lengthy recall process or waiting months or years for the next election.)
Conclusion: An excise tax of 15% should be imposed on all political ads to offset the cost of holding the election, cleaning up after the election and to compensate the public for years and years of political ads that were misleading and loaded with promises that were never kept.
The evidence of misleading and un-kept promises is well established in our history books:
- For the past 50 years, politicians from both parties have been promising to simplify the tax codes. (The tax code is likely the most complicated in the entire world and keeps getting more complicated year after year!)
- Politicians from both parties keep promising to improve our educational system. (The number of functionally illiterate citizens keeps growing year after year.)
3. Politicians from both parties keep promising to create a fair and workable health care plan for all Americans. (The last three efforts in this area have evaporated in endless debate.)
- Politicians from both parties keep promising to manage our national fiscal policy in a highly responsible manner. (In the year 2007, the national debt had increased over $8 trillion dollars since 1950. This is fiscal irresponsibility of a magnitude never equaled by any nation in history. If a bank had handled the depositors money in this manner, it would have lost its charter and many of their upper management team would have been sent to prison.)
In light of the historic facts mentioned above, it would seem a 15% excise tax on political ads is justified and long overdue.
But don’t hold your breath.
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Vince Johnson welcomes comments. Please send them to,Vince Johnson(vjadtrak@centurytel.net)
Vince Johnson welcomes comments. Please send them to,Vince Johnson(vjadtrak@centurytel.net)
See Vince in the new book Americans on Politics. Policy, and Pop-Culture.