jmdrake
03-22-2010, 09:49 PM
An idea just hit me over the weekend. On Friday the Tennessean reported that some of our hospitals would receive 99 millions in grants in this latest healthcare bill. On Sunday so called "blue dog democrat" Jim Cooper announced he would vote yes based party on support from hospitals. (I never had any doubts he was a yes vote. His idea of being "fiscally conservative" is raising taxes and cutting deductions.) Still, he might have held out a little to get some pork and grandstand. So I got to thinking. Could the state legislature strip the hospitals of it? Ok, it would be sort of "cutting off your nose to spite your face", but then again the tea thrown overboard during the Boston Tea Party was actually cheaper than what the colonists could have gotten elsewhere even with the tax. Sometimes you have to stand up for principle. (I'm not sure what to pork even if it could be confiscated by the state legislature. Give it to TN taxpayers? Return it to the national treasury with instructions to pay down the debt? Other ideas?) The first question is that of legality. (And I'm talking under current Supreme Court precedent as flawed as it is.) In McCulloch v. Maryland the Supreme Court held that the states could not tax federal institutions such as the national bank because the "power to tax" is the "power to destroy". (Yeah...that was the idea). But states have a right to tax private entities in their borders. And if you can have a "windfall profits tax" why not a "windfall pork tax"? What would be the effect of this? Well if institutions certain members of congress from certain states might have their pork stripped right out from under them they might be less inclined to spend money lobbying those members. I can't think of any case of the top of my had that would preclude this, but then there are zillions of cases and I couldn't know everyone. Still it's a fun idea. What about a federal occupation tax? Many states require certain physicians like doctors to pay a special tax. What about a BATF tax? An IRS agent tax? (Ok. I'm pretty sure there is case law to strike this down. But a guy can fantasize can't he?)